Roasted garlic and pumpkin risotto

Donna's Roasted Garlic and Pumpkin Risotto

Making good on my every Monday commitment, even after an internet problem that I fixed myself!! (the old turn off / turn on trick - my old IT work colleagues would be proud) is one of the first Donna's I ever made - her Roasted Garlic and Pumpkin Risotto, from issue 14, page 138. I should thank Crystal for this - she made it once years ago and it has been a favourite of my family's ever since! It is super easy, the only bother is the time standing at the stove while you stir the stock in, probably about 20 minutes. And it is very open to personal touches - the last time I made this (which isn't the photo below because we ate last weeks batch before I remembered to take a photo) I added sliced swiss mushrooms about halfway through adding the stock. I had planned to saute them and stir them through at the end with the pumpkin however our stovetop was already rather full because along side this risotto I was making a, ahem, breast milk risotto for Flynn. Which by-the-by he loved! But cooking the mushrooms in with the risotto worked well anyway.

This photo does not do the taste justice!

But back to the Donna - my top tips:

• I always throw a few extra garlic cloves into roast then the 8 she recommends because roasted garlic is LOVED in this house!
• I normally use dried oregano because I rarely have fresh in my crisper and it's still good
• I would recommend using a semi-decent stock rather then the powdered version/stock cube if you can, but it is still nice if you powdered is all you have. I used the new stock paste in a tube and it was good.
• If you put the pumpkin and garlic into the oven before doing anything else, it tends to be ready just as the risotto is ready. Nice!

Let me know if this is a regular in your house, or if you try making it for the first time.

And a question - has anyone made the dark chocolate and caramel pudding the the front of the last issue's cover? If so, is it worth cooking?

Classic barbecued pork ribs - Mr C.T.Sanger

Erm hmmm, hi (sheepish).
Sorry about the HUGE delay between posts, but a small technical difficulty (where I nearly lost the photos from Flynn's first 3 months of life PANIC in the disco but luckily the lovely Che fixed it) was followed by a rather large motivation difficulty... but I hereby state (ohhh the commitment scares me so) that apart from about 3 weeks in September when I toddle off to the UK I will post at least every Monday.

Classic barbecued pork ribs alla Donna

Anyways, enough with the babble. This will be short and sweet because I didn't even cook this (what a cop out for the first post back!) the lovely Mr C.T.Sanger did. Donna's classic barbecued pork ribs from issue 45, page 112. AH-FREAKING-MAZING. Or maybe it just happened to hit the spot at the time. But it was very more-ish, easy (well.... it was for me (o: ) and didn't take too long at all. Che added a little cumin and smoked paprika to the recipe, just because he likes the spices, and he couldn't see the cider vinegar right at the front of the cupboard so used half white wine and half balsamic, and said next time he would use all balsamic. It was also too cold to bbq outside so we ovened it on .... hmmm will get Che to let you know that one in the comments or this post will never get done..... a heat, I'll guess 200/220. Anyway, it's a recipe you can play around with and it is still YUM. The pre-boiling made the pork realllyyy tender and juicy and it didn't have a fatty feel or taste to it, just mouth watering bbqy goodness, it had a smokey taste even without actually barbecuing it, though both Che and I are keen to cook this again and try it on the bbq to compare. We served it with potato wedges and mayonnaise... and that was it. So bad! But sooooo good :o)

Classic pork ribs alla Che

I hope this inspires you to cook this, as warm wintry comfort food it was arrrgghhhh (homer drool). For those on a diet...... maybe see the beautiful post previous to this one :o)
Issue 45, page 112