Chicken, Garlic, Lemon and Rosemary Risotto

I adore risotto. I just can’t quite get enough. I defrosted some chicken breasts which needed to be eaten and we chose to go out instead so I was stuck with needing to cook them and them use them for the next evening. So I cooked them in the oven with olive oil, rosemary, lemon and garlic and then let it cool. I refrigerated the cooked chicken breasts over night and then chopped them up small and added them about half way through cooking the rice.

Ingredients

Roast Chicken
Two chicken breasts
5 cloves of minced garlic
1tsp dried rosemary
2tbsp lemon juice
Salt and Pepper to season

Risotto
Olive Oil
1 1/2 cups Risotto Rice (or Arborio Rice)
One medium onion (about a cup)
5 cups of chicken broth
Parmesan to serve

Instructions

Place the chicken breasts in an oven proof dish and drizzle with olive oil. Spread the minced garlic over the chicken breasts. Add the rosemary and the lemon juice. Cook in a preheated oven at 350F for 25 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through. Leave to cool and place in the fridge over night (or use right away depending on when you’re making the risotto – as I said earlier I needed to cook the chicken but didn’t need to cook dinner until the night after!).

For the risotto, heat 1 tbsp of olive oil in a hight sided pan and brown 1 cup of diced onion until golden. Stir in 1 1/2 cups of risotto rice and cook for one minute. Add 5 cups of chicken broth, one cup at a time, stirring constantly over medium heat. Add the diced, cooked chicken about 15 minutes later. Continue adding liquid until it’s all absorbed and the rice is cooked. Test a bit of the rice when you’re done with the stock to check it’s nice and tender. If it’s not, add some boiling water and wait until it reduces again. It should take about 20-30 minutes. Remove from the heat, season with salt and pepper and sprinkle with parmesan. Yum.