Corn Risotto with Anchovy Sage Leaf Bite

- Jenny

Don’t think I don’t know how your collective minds work. You think that I am madly in love with Corn Risotto Garnished with Bacon and Anchovy Sage Leaf Bite just because MyCommunalTable instructs you to drink wine while you cook. This is just a bonus people. There is a lot of excitement that is about to happen on your stove, so please don’t focus on drunk mommy!

Comfort food is one of those phrases that is as elastic as it is overused. Are we talking soft pillow comfort? That would be pudding. Fleece blanket? Maybe pot pies. But when what you need is not simply a culinary balm but a generous heap of anodyne, that’s risotto. Toss in corn and bacon, and well, you’ve got a suite at the Wynn, massage included.

Whenever you begin risotto, you understand your commitment. You will sip wine, sure, but you are going to have to stand there, stirring and thinking, and by the time it’s all through, you will have unraveled the flat tax, or at least secured some serious thoughts about the course of your own life, which may or may not feel a bit like a row boat on a large lake, floating without breeze.

Yes that’s right, low amylose grains so inspire!

I understand if you don’t have any homemade chicken stock on hand, and I also get that six cups is a lot to part with. But you do know that any you can give to this dish will be for the better; plus you can probably get away with just five.

Get your bacon crisped up, and then begin to boil your stock while you chop your onions. Once those are going in the pan of olive oil, do your sage and corn (I found some in the supermarket, God knows where it came from, so I am the last person to judge you if you want to use frozen. I can’t speak to others. But they’re not invited for dinner are they?)

From this point, once you’ve tossed in your rice and wine and stock, it is stir, stir, stir, ladle, stir. Stir more, ladle, sip, stir, stir. You fold the sage and corn in at the end, which will bring the starchy joy of this dish, threaded with the smoky goodness of sage, to its conclusion. Of course you do in fact want the cheese, and a sprinkle of bacon. I did not make the anchovy bites because that seemed beyond weeknight cooking to me, but if you do, whomever is eating with you will be comforted further indeed.

Corn Risotto Garnished with Bacon and Anchovy Sage Leaf Bite