Every other friday we get a box of organic fruit and vegetables delivered to our door. It feels like Christmas when the box arrives and we dive right into it to see which vegetables we get each week. Some vegetables are like close friends – we meet them on a day-to-day basis. Other vegetables are more like distant cousins – we barely know their names. Last Friday we got chard. And strange as it might be we had never cooked anything with chard before. So we were excited to find out what we could do with it.
Chard has some similarities to kale and spinach. You can use it raw in a salad, you can saute it or use it in any kind of stew, pasta or risotto. After some consideration we decided to make a new version of our favorite spinach risotto. But since we try to cook food without using white rice and pasta we wanted to use something else than the usual arborio rice. We have tried switching the rice for barley with a merely ok result. We couldn’t get the arborio creaminess from the barley. We have seen some recipes and heard stories about successful barley risottos – and we will surely try it again some day – but this time we made it a lot easier for ourselves. We used canned cannellini beans! It turned out to be the quickest risotto we had ever made. And it tasted really good too. You could do a lot more with this recipe: not using canned beans, adding white wine and maybe some more greens, but this version worked perfect for us. Quick, tasty, creamy and simple.
Cannellini & Chard Risotto
Serves 3-4
1 1/2 cup vegetable broth
2 tbsp olive oil
1 large onion (finely chopped)
2 cloves garlic (finely chopped)
1 chard (slice the leaves into thin strips, cut the smaller stems into 1/4-inch dice, discard the larger stems)
2 cans (2 cups) cannellini beans (rinsed well)
4 tbsp mascarpone cheese
1/2 lemon (juice and peel)
fresh thyme
salt and pepper
Bring vegetable broth to a bare simmer in a saucepan over medium heat and set aside.
Heat olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat, add onion, garlic and the stems of the chard. Cook for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally, until softened. Add one cup of the broth, cook and stir, until almost absorbed. Now add chard leaves, cannellini beans and the rest of the broth. Cook and stir for a couple of minutes, then add mascarpone cheese, lemon juice and thyme. Season with salt, pepper and more thyme if needed. Top it with some grated lemon peel before serving.
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14 Comments
Wow, yummy! This looks delicious. I envy you your vegetable delivery!
You have a beautiful blog!
Hi David! Who do you use for your fruit and vegetable delivery? We had årstiderna, but they came every week and we couldn’t get through all of those vegetables. And did you mean no-rice?
Oh wow, of course we meant Rice (not Rise), that was without doubt our biggest typo so far. Thank you! This only proves that I shouldn’t write blog posts in the middle if the night …
We also use Årstiderna as our supplier and we have chosen to get our box two times a month, which is perfect. If you look it up i’m sure you can do the same.
/David
I’m quite partial to a barley risotto, but I do love the sound of your beany twist too. And it all sounds so easy! I wonder if canned beans actually work a little better than freshly cooked – they’re usually a little softer
I totally understand – sent out an email yesterday misspelling an english and swedish word! I saw the option on Årstiderna – thanks!! Can’t wait to try this recipe.
Ya-um. I made this tonight – just a 1/2 recipe. I put it atop linguine with freshly steamed asparaguas on the side. Added a bit of white wine and used ricotta instead of mascarpone. I love lemon juice – adds the perfect pitch of flavor. I chased the whole affair with a bowl of vanilla ice cream topped with a wine vanilla bean reduction from the night before. Oh, and a truffle. Divine. Love your recipes.
Hi Carol!! Sounds like a delicious meal you made there
/Luise
wow what a great idea! i cant wait to make this!
Beautiful!! And fabulous blog, too! So glad I discovered you!
This looks delicious! We’ve been getting lots of fresh chard from the farm, and this looks like the perfect recipe for it! I’m going to give it a try.
Made this tonight! WOW! Delicious and creamy and filling. I substituted a fresh bunch of organic lacinato kale instead. Bravo!
Wonderful Fabulii
glad you liked it!
/Luise
I just found your website today and have already made this dish and the nut bars and both are fantastic! This dish was so rich and creamy i’m in love! I look forward to testing out your other recipes!!
I like the idea of a quick risotto! It’s funny, in Australia we eat silverbeet (chard) almost to the exclusion of real spinach. It must be a climate thing.