TUNA OVER ARTICHOKE RISOTTO WITH TWO PESTOS
Prep time 60 minutes
Active prep time 60 minutes
Special equipment needed – Food processor
Special skills needed – None
Serves 4
For any Italians reading this, I’m sorry in advance. This recipe breaks a rule that many Italians take very seriously. Never mix cheese with fish. Like putting chicken on a pizza, putting cheese on fish will horrify the Italians. In this recipe, we violate this convention 3 different ways: once in each pesto and once in the risotto. Three different horribly delicious ways. There are about 12 ounces of Parmesan in this meal. So, with that said, there are many things to love about this dish. For one, it is a complete meal all by itself. It has artichokes and onions and tomatoes and fresh basil. It lends itself to a small sized portion of fish, which is a good thing with tuna. I like yellowfin tuna, but these big majestic fish should be celebrated and preserved. When you eat one, it should be a small amount, it should be treated carefully, and you should savor it. So, make sure you don’t sear it too deeply and enjoy this dish with a nice glass of white wine…or break another rule and pair it with a bold, dark, red.
INGREDIENTS:
For the tuna:
1 ½ lbs yellowfin tuna
1 Tablespoon Olive oil
Salt and fresh cracked pepper to taste
For the Risotto:
5 Tablespoons Butter
1 Cup Arborio rice
1 Yellow onion - chopped
4 to 6 Cups Chicken stock
1 Cup White wine
1 Cup Artichoke hearts – chopped
½ Cup Parmesan Cheese
Salt and Pepper to taste
For the Green Pesto:
¼ Cup walnuts
½ to ¾ Cup Olive oil
3 Cloves Garlic
2 Cups Fresh Basil
½ Cup Parmesan
Juice of ½ Lemon
Salt and pepper to taste
For the Red Pesto:
¼ Cup walnuts
½ to ¾ Cup Olive oil
3 Cloves Garlic
1 Cup Jarred Sun Dried tomatoes
½ Cup Parmesan
Juice of ½ Lemon
Salt to taste
You can make the pesto well in advance because it keeps for up to a week. That’s good to know because you’ll definitely have some leftover and it goes great on a cracker, tossed with pasta, or rubbed onto chicken. Make sure to keep it for a snack later. If you are good at multi-tasking, you can make the pesto while the risotto is cooking, but keep in mind that risotto takes a lot of love, so it will be less stressful if you do the pesto early.
The pesto is simple. For the green pesto, toast the nuts with a little olive oil in a sauté pan over medium heat for 2 minutes. Add the garlic and cook for 1 more minute, stirring often. Put this into a food processor along with the basil and blend while adding olive oil until the mix becomes liquid enough to settle on the bottom of the bowl. It should be a little more liquid than you want the final product so that when you add the parmesan it doesn’t get too thick. Add the parmesan and mix until it is incorporated. Then taste and season with salt, pepper, and lemon juice. The lemon juice helps the pesto retain it’s vibrant colors, so make sure you use at least 1 tablespoon of it.
For the red pesto, everything is the same except that you use sun dried tomatoes in place of the basil. With the sun dried tomatoes, you can use the olive oil that they come packed in, so you probably won’t need to add any more. You will want to blend this a little longer than you would the basil and also use a little bit more lemon juice to counteract the natural sweetness of the tomatoes.
For the risotto, melt the butter in a large skillet and then add the Arborio and chopped onions. Cook these over medium heat, stirring frequently until the onions become translucent. Heat the chicken stock over medium heat in a separate saucepan. Add a cup of white wine to the Arborio mixture and cook until it reduces by half. At that point, start adding the stock, 1 cup at a time, allowing it to reduce each time, until the Arborio is softened to your desired texture. It will probably take about 25 minutes and 5 cups of stock, but it can vary. Stir frequently throughout the entire process. Once the Arborio is ready, add the chopped artichokes and parmesan cheese and remove from heat.
For the tuna, heat a cast iron pan over high heat. Get it as hot as you can. You shouldn’t need any oil in a well-seasoned cast iron pan, so I just brush the tuna with a small amount of olive oil and don’t put any in the pan. Season the tuna with salt and coarse cracked black pepper. Sear the fish on all sides. It should cook just enough to get a pleasing light brown crust on the outside, but not to cook the fish all the way through. This takes 2 to 4 minutes, depending on how you like your tuna. I like mine mostly raw, so just a couple minutes will do it.
Slice the tuna and serve on a bed of the risotto, making sure the risotto is not so hot that it continues to cook the tuna. Top with alternating small dollops of pesto. If you don’t want to mess with the fancy presentation, you can just serve the pesto on the side.
