Recipe for Arancine di riso

I am not used to writing recipes…I did not copy this from a book. This is what I have come up with through trial and error, after consultations with old and wise Sicilian women, and comparison between mine and the best ones Palermo has to offer.
If you find any problems and inconsistencies in the following recipe, please let me know. I have written it by visualizing myself going through the steps of preparing them.

I like to prepare the rice the night before. It is important that the rice has absorbed the liquid and will stick together quite well. This recipe makes about 20 Arancine the size of a medium orange.

Rice:

Ingredients:

4 cups of Arborio rice
8 cups of water
1 scant tablespoon of salt
1/2 stick of butter
1 good handful of parmesan
Saffron (the content of 3 small envelopes of powdered Saffron)

Combine together and bring to boil. Lower the heat and cook covered until all liquid is absorbed. Leave in the fridge overnight.

Filling:

Ingredients:

1lbs of extra lean ground beef and 1 lbs of ground pork ( you can use all beef if you prefer)
1 onion
1 stalk of celery
1 carrot
1 good sprig of parsley
1 large can of peeled tomatoes ( the plum kind)
1 glass of red wine
1 small pinch of grated nutmeg
1 cup of frozen peas ( optional )
3 tablespoons of olive oil.
Salt and pepper to taste

Make the "battuto" with the onion, carrot, celery, and parsley.
In a wide deep pan ( I use a Chinese wok) brown the meat in olive oil. Add the battuto and brown some more. Add wine and let evaporate. Add the tomatoes (it's better if they are pureed in the food processor), salt and pepper. Let cook covered on low heat for two hours. Add peas and cook until tender. Add nutmeg. The resulting ragu should not contain too much liquid. Skim the fat appearing on the surface. Let rest and cool completely ( it can also rests one night in the fridge).

Filling and forming the Arancine:

This is the most difficult part!

Have ready 3 large deep dishes. One with beaten and salted eggs (at least 4), one with fine breadcrumbs, one with flour. A small bowl with water is also a good idea to dip your hands in. Wet hands make the process easier.
Take a handful of rice and make a well on it. Place the ragu on it (one small tablespoon should be enough) and cover with another handful of rice. Form a ball squeezing the rice around the filling. If filling comes through poke it in and apply more rice. It's not easy, could be frustrating, takes practice...but can be done! Place this nice firm ball of rice in flour, then roll it in beaten eggs and then in breadcrumbs always firming and shaping with your hands.
Deep fry to a golden brown, a few at a time, in vegetable oil .

Arancine are good the day after, and can also be frozen.

www.ritamonacostudio.com

[This message was edited by RITAM on December 30, 2002 at 01:06 PM.]

Thank you, Rita. This looks wonderful!

Amy in MA
Amy's House Exchange

If any of you ever makes them, please let me know how they turn out. It's not a simple dish but worth the effort.

Happy New Year!!

www.ritamonacostudio.com

Dear Rita,
I have an old sicilian recipe book, very interesting, written by Alberto Denti di Pirajno. Normally the arancine has not tomatoes inside but there are many different opinion about it: there are with peas, without peas, with butter, without butter, and so on...He wrote this recipe (hoping I could translate correctly!):
For 6 people: put in a casserole 3 hg. of beef and few chicken meat, with minced onion, celery, sage, oregano, pepper and salt. Add a glass of oil and cook it at "fuoco lento" for 1 hr. When the meat is cooked you have to chop it and put newly on for a while. In the meantime you have to boil 1/2 kg. of rice and when it will be cooked add 2 eggs and grated cheese (I suppose caciocavallo or parmesan, he doesn't mention which). When the rice is cold, you put some of that in your hand ("una cucchiaiata") and fill it with a teaspoon of meat and its sauce; put another spoon of rice just to form a ball, like a small orange. Put it in the flour, after in the beaten egg and in the breadcrumb.
Fry it and Buon appetito!

Lia
webmaster of Bed & Breakfast Association of Rome
webmaster@b-b.rm.it

www.b-b.rm.it

Hmmmmm ....I have a few problems with this recipe. Sage is almost never used the Sicilian cooking I know (the western part of Sicily is what I am familiar with) and so is celery ( called "Accia" in sicilian dialect. A much more pungent version of celery as we know it, very similar to Celeriac ).I am using a bit of celery and carrots in my recipe to make a battuto but this is possibly due to a Tuscan influence and they could (and maybe should) be left out. Also the arancine I know do not have oregano in the sauce which is a red sauce possibly done originally with "estratto" (a strong tomato paste), and not with canned tomatoes as I do because I do not have access to the original estratto. Also, try to add beaten eggs to warm rice and see what happens....
I am referring here to the Palermitan arancine, which I believe are the original ones. In the Siracusa, Catania part of Sicily, they are possibly done in a different way. Sicilian food varies quite a bit from city to city and the eastern part of the island has recipes that have the same name but are quite different from those of the western part. Paste con sarde in Siracusa is very different from pasta con sarde in Palermo. Your recipe may be also original, but is not the Palermitan one. I lived in Palermo for two years and have eaten arancine in the best Tavole Calde and rosticcerie. ( You will rarely find them in restaurants). The recipe I report, while possibly not being the very old, original one, is the one that results in arancine as you will find today in Palermo.

www.ritamonacostudio.com

[This message was edited by RITAM on January 04, 2003 at 06:06 PM.]

[This message was edited by RITAM on January 04, 2003 at 06:09 PM.]