The Yum Yum Factor

Poor Shack. Two of the things that he loves the most are things I almost never make for him - veal parmesan and arancini. To make arancini, you need to have cold, leftover risotto but, trust me, if I am going to stand over a stove, stirring rice, for half an hour, I am not going to put it all aside to use for fried rice balls. Occasionally, I might have gone out of my way to double the recipe so that I could make these the next day but, honestly,  that often just resulted in gluttony. We were left with all of us rolling around the house, moaning and groaning, with too much food in our bellies and still not enough leftover rice. Enter my Instant Pot. Since making my first batch of risotto in the pressure cooker, I have not looked back. I was the last person who wanted to believe that you could end up with a risotto that was indistinguishable from a lovingly stirred pan of soupy rice but, here I am, making risotto in the pressure cooker all the live long day...

What do you do with three cups of leftover risotto al nero de seppia ? Make arancini, of course. Although everyone in the house loves these crispy little risotto balls, I rarely make them because, frankly, I am still terrified of deep frying. The odd time I make them, I either bake them or pan fry them in a shallow pan with a bit of oil and although good, they aren't amazing. To really enjoy an arancini, you need the crispy crust that you crack to reveal the soft, creamy rice innards and you can really only get that crust by deep frying them. Now that I am 50, I have decided it is high time to face some of my fears in the face so I pulled out a small pot, a bottle of canola oil and my instant read thermometer and did what needed to be done. I am not going to tell you that it was a walk in the park, emotionally, but I buckled down and heated that damned oil all the way to 350F and deep fried these arancini like a boss. The panko adds a bit more substance to the coating but...