If you’re one of those people who gets irritated by the specter of pumpkin spice — or, gasp, Halloween decor — on an 85-degree week in September; if you understand that there are what will feel like infinite months left to spend shivering and longing for stew, and there’s no reason to beckon them any sooner; if you find yourself gritting out “but there’s another week of summer!” at your screen when confronted with ads for wool coats and other things you simply refuse to acknowledge before you must, come sit down. You’re among friends.
Well, a single friend. It’s feeling lonely here. But I insist upon embracing summer cooking for as long as summer produce lasts — tomatoes in particular. I miss them all winter too much to throw them out of the kitchen when the first apple arrives.
[I also want to make it absolutely clear that no matter how it seems, I am not projecting my complicated feelings about one child starting middle school and the other, their senior year of high school, on dwindling summer produce. Not even a little.]
Right, so: Have you ever made these rice-stuffed tomatoes? My favorite part is the way the short-grain rice absorbs that clear-noted, pure tomato sauce. I think about it all of the time and it led me here, to a just-the-filling standalone recipe. To make a tomato risotto as simple and uncluttered as possible, I use grated tomato pulp, a bit of onion and garlic, and a glug of wine. Since I really want it to taste like those tomatoes, I even use water instead of broth.
That’s not the only risotto sacrilege I commit, because as we discussed a few years ago, almost everything we’ve been taught is mandatory about making risotto turns out not to be, including the aforementioned broth, but also constant stirring and heaps of butter and cheese.
The single lily gilded was my desire for a crisp topping that wasn’t one of the obvious ones, like pan-crisped prosciutto, salami, or bacon. Instead, we’re using thinly-sliced red onions we “frizzle” early in the cooking process. Half go into the baked risotto, half are sprinkled on top in the end, and I’m obsessed with the fragrance, depth, and gentle kiss of cooler flavors they impart in this insistently late-summer dish. Finish with basil leaves, parmesan, and a knob of butter or drizzle of olive oil if you wish. Or, you could keep this entirely vegan with just olive oil, basil, and the onions. There’s so much flavor, you won’t miss a thing.
