Farro for a different kind of risotto

I bought a bottle of farro with dried porcini mushrooms at Homesense. I love that store for the interesting food items it carries - and at damn fine prices to boot.

Farro, often incorrectly called spelt, is an ancient grain. A little chewy with a slightly nutty flavour, farro cooks in about 30 to 45 minutes. As farro cooks, one adds preheated chicken broth a little at a time in a manner similar to that used when cooking risotto. (I should add that in Italy, my bottle of farro came from Italy, the confusion is so deep that the two terms, farro and spelt, are used interchangeably on the labels. The New York Times has a widely quoted article addressing the mix-up.)

With it being the end of summer in southwestern Ontario, I had to add fresh vegetables. To this end, I bought field tomatoes, zucchini, fresh mushrooms, garlic and flat-leaf parsley from a farmer's market. I also used some basil from my garden. And lastly, I chopped up one hot, Italian sausage with fennel and I fried it with the vegetables.

Ingredients

1/4 cup chopped flat-leaf parsley
1 cup farro
1/4 cup dry white wine. I like a good box wine for cooking as it keeps.
1/4 cup chopped fresh basil
1 cup of chopped fresh field tomato
1 garlic clove minced
A little olive oil
2/3 cup of chopped fresh mushrooms
2 3/4 cups of low-sodium chicken stock
1 hot Italian sausage coarsely chopped (Optional. Vegetarians can eliminate this.)

Directions

First, fry the fresh mushrooms, chopped into big chunks.When lightly browned, add a cup of hot chicken stock, a cup of farrow, a quarter cup of wine and bring all to a simmer. Simmer gently for five minutes or until the liquid is almost completely absorbed.

Add a quarter cup of hot chicken stock and keep the pan simmering. (I like to preheat the chicken stock so that adding it does not stop the simmering.) As the chicken stock is absorbed, add another quarter cup of chicken broth. This cannot be hurried. When all the chicken stock has been added and absorbed or reduced, the farro should be cooked. This may take from 30 to 45 minutes.

While the farro is cooking, cut the Italian sausage into large chunks and fry in a little olive oil in another frying pan - a larger, deeper frying pan. One with a tight-fitting lid is perfect. The lid keeps the heat in and minimizes splatter. When the sausage has clearly started to cook, add the zucchini slices and a little more olive oil if necessary. Don't let the zucchini completely cook. The zucchini should not cook so long it gets mushy.

Of course, vegetarians can omit the sausage and go right to cooking the zucchini. If you do this, start the cooking of the vegetables a little later. Like I said earlier, you don't want to have mushy veggies.

Add the minced garlic to the pan of fried zucchini, fry for about thirty seconds, don't burn the garlic, now, add the tomato chunks and simmer all gently.

Even though no tomato sauce has been added, the frying pan should have some tasty liquid gathering at the bottom of the pan. This is mostly juice from the tomatoes. If you have timed this right, the farro should be done as the tomato chunks begin to look cooked and the liquid has all but disappeared. Add the cooked farro, the parsley and the chopped basil. Toss, salt to taste and serve.

I added some fresh ground pepper some dried, hot pepper flakes at the table. My wife also added a little more salt. We both agreed that this was delicious.

If you are a vegetarian, you might consider adding some chopped fennel to this recipe. My sausage had fennel and it was a nice additional flavour.