Carrabba's Arancini

Home reconstruction

Arancini are made from leftover risotto, and the risotto that works is not the risotto you would want to eat.

Properly cooked risotto is loose and flowing — al dente grains in a creamy suspension. Try to roll it into balls and it falls apart in your hands and then disintegrates in the oil.

What you want is risotto cooked slightly past that point: starchier, stickier, drier. The rice has released more starch and there is less free liquid, so the mass holds together.

If you are making risotto specifically for arancini, cook it four or five minutes longer than you otherwise would and use slightly less stock.

Cold is doing most of the work

Four hours in the fridge, minimum. Overnight is better.

As it cools, the starch retrogrades — the same process that makes day-old rice firm — and the risotto goes from spoonable to sliceable. You can cut it with a knife when it is properly cold.

Warm risotto cannot be shaped, full stop. This is not a step to compress.

Wet hands, firm pressure

Rice sticks to dry hands and you end up with more on your palms than in the ball. A bowl of water beside you, hands dipped between each one.

Press firmly. Unlike meatballs, arancini want compaction — air pockets inside turn to steam in the fryer and blow the ball open.

The mozzarella centre

A cube of mozzarella in the middle, completely enclosed. Any gap and the cheese finds it and escapes into the oil.

Use low-moisture mozzarella, the block kind, not fresh in water. Fresh mozzarella releases a lot of liquid as it melts, which is another way these burst.

What you need

Risotto

• 300 g arborio rice
• 1 litre chicken stock, hot
• 1 onion, finely diced
• 120 ml white wine
• 80 g parmesan, grated
• 3 tbsp butter, 2 tbsp olive oil
• salt and black pepper

To assemble

• 150 g low-moisture mozzarella, in 1.5 cm cubes
• 100 g plain flour
• 3 eggs, beaten
• 200 g fine breadcrumbs
• oil for frying

Method

1. Soften the onion in the oil and 1 tbsp butter, 5 minutes.
2. Rice in, stirred for 2 minutes until the grains look translucent at the edges.
3. Wine, cooked off.
4. Stock a ladle at a time, stirring, until absorbed — about 22 minutes, which is deliberately longer than usual.
5. Off the heat, the remaining butter and the parmesan. Season.
6. Spread on a tray to cool, then refrigerate 4 hours.
7. With wet hands, take a golf-ball of risotto, flatten it, put a mozzarella cube in the centre, and close it completely. Roll firmly.
8. Flour, then egg, then breadcrumbs. Then egg and breadcrumbs a second time.
9. Chill the coated balls 30 minutes.
10. Fry at 175°C for 3–4 minutes, until deep golden.

Double-coat them

Flour, egg, crumb, egg, crumb. The second layer is what stops the cheese finding a way out, and it gives the thick, craggy crust these have.

A single coating splits often enough that it is not worth the saved effort.

175°C, not hotter

These are already cooked — you are heating them through and melting the centre. At 190°C the crumb is dark before the middle is warm.

Storing

Uncooked and coated, three months in the freezer. Fry from frozen at 170°C for 6–7 minutes, which is arguably the best method since they are guaranteed cold.

Cooked, two days in the fridge. Reheat at 190°C for 8 minutes.