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Salami Risotto; protesting farmers Recipe
by Katie Zeller

This risotto gives me a great reason to buy salami, which I dearly love, but rarely have in the house.

It’s far too moor-ish to have in the fridge on a regular basis. Both mon mari and I would be sneaking it for impromptu snacks and it would be quickly gone. As it is I kept this well-hidden until after I made the risotto.

I get small cans of beans, which give me just 1 cup. Use more if you have a larger quantity.

Flageolet are like small lima beans – use another small white bean or cannellini if you don’t find them.

Salami Risotto

Total time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

Instructions:

Heat chicken stock and keep hot over low heat.

In medium sauce pan heat butter; add 1/2 onion and sauté until transparent.

Add rice and sauté, stirring, for 2 – 3 minutes until rice has white center.

Add white wine and stir.

Start condimenti.

When rice has almost absorbed all the wine add a 1/3 cup of stock, stir. (No need to stir constantly but do stir from time to time.) When stock is almost absorbed add another 1/3 cup and continue adding 1/3 cup at a time and stirring.

Before you add the last 1/3 cup taste a few kernels of rice. They should be just ‘al dente’ – slightly resistant to the tooth but fully cooked. If more stock is needed add it a few tbs at a time and waiting until almost completely absorbed.

At this point risotto will be thick but not stiff – there will still be visible liquid and it will not hold it’s shape on a plate.

Add the Parmesan and the condimenti, stir well, spoon into a bowl or risotto platter and serve immediately. It will continue to absorb liquid and the leftovers (if any) will be quite stiff.

Condimenti

While risotto is cooking, heat oil in small skillet.

Add the rest of the onion and sauté until tender.

Cut salami in half or quarters and add to onions.

Roughly chop tomato and add to condimenti.

Drain and rinse beans. Add to skillet and heat through.

Keep warm until needed for risotto.

We had an interesting morning.

As usual, on Friday, we headed off to do the weekly shopping.

When we got to the round-a-bout near town that takes us to the LeClerc (supermarket) there was traffic backed up and a gendarme talking to the car at the head of the line.

Great, we thought…. Random paperwork check. Not a problem, just a bit tedious.

But the gendarmes usually wave the cars over, out of the way, rather than standing and blocking traffic.

Hmmm…..

We watched. He spent a minute or so talking to each car, then waved them on.

Curious.

When we reached him we said ‘Bonjour’.

He asked us where we we were going.

We said ‘LeClerc’.

He said ‘non….’

We thought he said ‘le bouchon’ which means cork or stopper, and is a term used for a traffic jam.

So, we would have to take a detour…. No problem. We headed off to LeClerc.

In retrospect he could have said ‘la bougie’ which means candle as there were bales of hay piled in the round-a-bout at the entrance to LeClerc. They were burning furiously and throwing up plumes of black smoke.

Ah, that’s the problem, we thought and drove around the back.

We couldn’t get into the parking lot. All the entrances we blocked by farm tractors.

The farmers were protesting…. That explained the burning hay bales.

Naturally, we did what the French were doing – went down a one way entrance the wrong way to get into the parking lot.

When we were done shopping I asked the cashier what the protest was about. It wasn’t a general protest, they were specifically targeting LeClerc because, in the opinion of the farmers, LeClerc was selling meat and milk too cheaply.

I’m sure they all, farmers and gendarmes, took a break for lunch, then finished the protest this afternoon.

They rarely last more than a day.

Last update on February 5, 2016

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