Forbidden black rice, vongole & tomato risotto

My friends at Forbidden Foods have sent me a box of samples to test in the steam oven.  What fun this is going to be!  I thought I would start with the Black Rice which is their original product (they now also have Red Rice and the new amazing Green Rice).  It is not long grain black rice as we know it here (which is actually Wild Rice) but a short grain, par-boiled rice from China.

This is a recipe for the Black rice in a risotto as everyone who knows about a steam oven can confirm that risotto cooked in this appliance is absolutely fabulous.  No stirring, just sauté off your ingredients add the dry rice before adding the stock and placing it in the steam oven.  Some people don’t even do that, just choosing to put everything into the solid stainless steel tray to begin with but I think the flavour is better using this method.  I also cooked it in this shallow casserole which looked stunning for serving and only one pan to wash up!

Ingredients: Serves 4

1¼ cups Forbidden black rice
1-2tbsp olive oil
1 medium onion, diced
2 cloves garlic
2 birdseye chilli, seeded and finely diced or to your taste
1½ cups fish stock
1kg Vongole, soaked in fresh water for 1 hour, scrubbed then drained
1 vine ripened tomato, diced
fresh coriander to serve

Method:

1. Sauté onion and garlic in the olive oil on low heat until soft.
2. Add the black rice and chilli and stir to coat.
3. Now add the stock.
4. Place into the solid steamer tray @ 100°C for 30 minutes, stir
5. Now change the cooking temperature to 85°C, add Vongole and cook another 10 minutes to open the shells.
6. Remove from the steam oven and open any shells that are partially open with a sharp knife.  Discard any that are unopened.
7. Leaving the Vongole on the top, scatter the tomato around the shells and top with coriander.
8. Squeeze over half a lemon to serve 🙂

Photograph was using 500g Vongole and 1 cup rice which would only serve 2-3 so I altered the quantities to Serve 4 as above.