$2 Meals: Lemon Risotto

Everybody tells me risotto is hard. While I’m sure that some techniques probably do make it difficult, or rather, insanely time consuming, to make risotto, it doesn’t have to be like that. Risotto is not really a “rich people” food, per se. I originally was going to do this as a $1 meal, but y’all don’t want to see my stripped down version (read as: no dairy or wine), so we’ll give ourselves a bit of wiggle room.

But for the record, you really can do this without the dairy or wine. That’s honestly how I usually do it, which strips down the cost quite a bit. It’s not a traditional risotto that way per se, but it is still a lovely dinner porridge. If you didn’t realize until this moment that risotto is just a dinner porridge, you’re welcome.

Quick note: for ingredients cost, I’ll now be using Walmart prices since more people have access to that store than Texas-based HEB or other places where I often shop. Instead of doing more exhaustive price explanations, I will simply be noting my cost based on Walmart prices (the cost of portion of the ingredients actually used, not the entire package) and the cost if you had to buy the whole package. It’ll look like this:

2 cups medium or short grain rice ($0.64/$1.93)

It should be noted that if you aren’t buying long-grain rice from Walmart, the rice is super expensive in terms of total package cost. That said, Kroger’s per unit cost on medium grain is way more expensive, at nearly a dollar per pound.

I’ll include links to verify ingredient pricing so y’all can see more clearly how I break down per use cost v. real cost of each package if you’re starting out without pantry staples already in the home.

Here’s what you’ll need

1 small onion, diced (about 1/2 cups of diced onion, or roughly 4 ounces) ($0.22)

2 cloves garlic, minced (1 bulb is $0.47, so assuming you got one that only has 6 cloves, that’s $0.16)

2 tablespoons oil or other fat (olive is traditional; use what you have) ($0.15/$2.82)

2 cups of medium or short grain rice ($0.64/$1.93)

4-6 cups water or broth (I used water to keep the cost down in the $2 range; often I use only one 50 cent can and do the rest in water so as to get the flavor without the $2+ cost of using all broth)($0.50, assuming we watered down a can of broth)

salt and pepper to taste (about 5 cents total; pepper and salt bought for this will be $2.38)

1 juice small lemon (save the rinds in the freezer to grate into other things later; it’s easier when they’re frozen) or 2 tablespoons of lemon juice (lemons are $0.52, juice is $0.88 for 4.5oz, which is about $0.22 for this recipe)

1/4-1/2 cup of wine (cheapest available is $2.26 for a 750mL bottle, and that’s $0.36-$0.72 for this recipe)

2 tablespoons parmesan ($2.22 for whole bag, $0.18 for the cheese)

Normally you also would use about a tablespoon of butter at the end, which I left out because I did include the wine and cheese so we couldn’t afford to add butter and keep it under $2 total just like we couldn’t afford the broth without going a bit over.

Total cost: $2.48 for 4 servings with the can of broth, $1.98 for 4 servings using water instead.

Total cost if you’re buying everything ground up: $13.68

I really do recommend leaving the broth, wine, cheese, and butter out if you’re on a strict budget. The difference in flavor legitimately isn’t a big enough deal to break your personal budget over. You should also feel free to add other spices you have on hand, or other foods like bits of meat or veggies alongside or instead of the onion and garlic.

If you do have a bit of extra money you’d like to add flavor with, I recommend grinding an equal mix of coriander seed and dried onion and using this as a spice blend in this risotto and basically everything. It adds way more flavor than it should and is fairly inexpensive to make!

Here’s what you’ll do

Heat a 12” skillet over medium heat and add your oil. Once it’s nice and hot, toss in your onions with some salt and pepper, and any other seasonings you chose to use. Fry those up, then add your garlic and move that around the pan for another minute or so. At this point, you’re supposed to remove your veg to fry the rice. I don’t ever do this because I don’t want to wash more dishes than I have to.

You also should heat your broth or water. I never do this. Ross always does it. It seems to make no difference beyond the number of dishes you have to wash.

Fry the rice next. It should be pretty see-through when it’s done. If you removed your veggies, add them back in now.

Add your wine and lemon juice, one at a time, stirring the rice constantly. Then start adding in your broth or water, about a cup at a time, stirring constantly. It’s important to stir, especially early on, to get those starches working for you to make the rice creamy. If you normally rinse your rice, don’t do it when you’re making risotto. You’re just rinsing off the needed starch.

When you’re stirring and it takes time for the liquid to fill those empty stir lines, it’s time for the next ladle! You’ll keep doing this process until the rice is cooked through and has a creamy texture. You have to taste it periodically in order to really know for sure if it’s done. Sometimes it looks done and it isn’t, and sometimes it looks done and it’s overdone and gross.

Once it’s actually done, cut the heat and stir in your parm and butter, if using. Let it sit 5 minutes or so on the stove to finish setting up.

Total cost if you don’t need to buy everything: $1.98

Per serving cost: about $0.50

If you have some parsley laying around, it looks nice and adds a bit of “green” flavor to the porridge.