The peas are here: risibisi

When we went to the market on Saturday, one of the vendors told us she would have shelling peas next week. I was all set, and then this morning, in an unusually frantic and hectic Monday market, I found them with another vendor: my buddy Nevia. The first peas, Guy's favorite vegetable. Well, ain't no question, a couple of pounds of them went into the bag.

If you don't like peas, you should try them anyway, because peas are good for you. And this is important to keep in mind because, ultimately, the truth is that many vegetables, while not bad for you, aren't really powerhouses of nutrition. My own favorite stringbeans for example, have almost no nutritional value. And if you think about thinks like cucumbers, lettuce, radishes, celery, and many of those veggies you love, ultimately they have some fiber, but not much else. But peas are probably the best source of dietary fiber you can find, they're loaded with vitamins, and honestly, if they're cooked well, they taste really good.

What I think has happened to many of us, especially those of my age, is that we grew up on canned peas. YUCH. Remember those gray/green balls of disgusting texture that got put on the plate next to a piece of overcooked liver with some gross carrots on the side? No wonder you don't like them. And if you were lucky enough to be in a house where frozen peas were served, the folks who were cooking at the time probably were under the spell of books like "The Joy of Cooking" which, while wonderful in many ways, did not do much for the cause of vegetables. I think they recommended cooking peas for forty minutes. Well, you'll get the gray green sludge if you do that.

Frozen peas are wonderful. As I've written, they are one of the few frozen vegetables allowed in the house and now, as the season begins, I will freeze bags of them myself, uncooked, just shelled and into the freezer for when there ain't none. But don't let the fresh ones pass you by.

Usually, you have to shell them. But there's a wonderful recipe from Elizabeth David, the queen of English cooking, that is so simple, sounds so ravishing that I am going to have to try it. What she suggests is boiling the peas, in the pod, for about 12 minutes and making a bunch of melted butter. Then, she says, put the butter in a bowl, put the peas in another one. Dip the peas in the butter and then slide the pod through your teeth.

Sounds good to me. But I'm going to provide you with a recipe that I've promised, something called "risi bisi," which sounds much nicer than what it means, which is "rice and peas." (Italian can be such a pretty language. "riso," is rice, so "risi" is the plural. A pea is a "piso," so plural is "pisi." And a p after a vowel becomes a "b" Got it?). Actually many of the phrases that mean rice and peas sound so poetic. "Arroz con gandules," which is rice with "pigeon peas," is one of my favorite dishes, and doesn't that sound like a nice phrase (and now that it's on my mind, I may be asking my friend Nelson to make me some).

Ok. Annalena is digressing again. What else is new? Let's talk about making risibisi, which is sort of a soft, wet risotto. What you'll need, to start, is two pounds of peas in the pod. This is going to give you about two cups of shelled peas. You will also need about 3.5 cups of broth, or water, or stock of some kind. You can make this into a vegetarian meal, you can even make it a vegan meal. Traditionally, you start with chicken or beef stock, but if you want, you can use water or vegetable stock. And what you do is you take a good, solid cup of those pea pods, after the peas have been removed, and dump them into your stock. Then, cook this slowly for about ten minutes. Drain the stock or water from the pods. You'll notice a slightly greener color to the liquid, and a mild pea aroma. That's what you want. If you cook them too long, it will begin to taste very bitter. If you have cooked off some of the stock, then replenish it to get back to those 3.5 cups.

While this is happening, you can do the other steps of the dish. These involve chopping about half of an onion (or, if you happen to have a spring onion, nice and small, the whole thing). Saute this in half a stick of butter (it sounds like a lot, but there's more sauteing to come). If you want to make this vegan, you can use olive oil. When the onion is translucent, add just over a cup of short grain rice, like arborio, to the pot, and stir to coat it with the fat. Then add the peas and do the same thing. It is a good idea to add about a teaspoon of salt here. Some think it helps preserve the color of the peas, but I'm not sure.

Now, add the broth, all of it, and bring this to a simmer. Cover the pot, lower the heat, and let it cook for about twenty minutes. Yes, this is a long time, and the peas will begin to lose their bright green color. It's a compromise worth making, as the flavor develops. Keep an eye on the dish, because this is something you eat with a spoon. You want it to be wet, but not "soup wet." When the rice is tender, and the peas are soft, then take it off of the flame, and stir in half a cup of grated parmesan cheese, if you're not doing this vegan style. Taste it and correct the salt and add some pepper, if you like.

And there it is! It's untraditional, but you could stir in some mint (a natural accompaniment to peas), or some cooked sausage if you wanted to, but try it the first time just as plain old rice and peas.

Traditionally, this is eaten for the first time in the year on April 29, the feast day of St Mark, I believe, who is the patron saint of Venice, which is where this dish is supposed to have originated. I guess if you can be in Venice on April 29, you should definitely have it and try to get the blessings of St Mark. For those of us who can't make it, well, settle for eating some really good food that is very easy to make.

Sometimes, we have this as a main dish, because we like it so much and eat all of the recipe above. But it works well if you want to follow it with something like a grilled chicken, or a chop of some kind, or fish, or frankly, just about anything.

Gradisca