A unique twist on risotto using farro instead of rice. If you don’t have farro you can use brown rice or long-grained rice, just adjust the liquid…but we love the nuttiness that the farro adds to this dish.

What you need:

• 2 cups of farro
• 1 small onion
• Oil, I prefer Sunflower
• 1 qt of stock, I’m using chicken
• 2 – 3 cups of white wine or other liquid
• 8 oz of shredded hard cheese, I’m using Lanchego
• 2 tbs of butter
• Seasoning, I’m using Garden Citrus
• 1/2 of Robin’s Koginut squash*
• Handful of mushrooms
• Optional, 2 gloves of garlic

Preheat oven to 425° F

Dice onion. Then in a large heavy Dutch oven or pot, put a glug of oil and over medium heat cook onion until translucent, about 3 mins. Add in farro and toast for a couple of minutes. Start adding in your stock, one cup at a time. Stir occasionally. Once liquid is absorbed, add next cup.

Meanwhile, cut your squash in to bite-sized pieces and slice your mushrooms (clean any dirt away on your mushrooms with damp cloth). Put squash and mushrooms on a sheet pan and coat lightly with oil, salt & pepper. Roast in oven for about 10 minutes or golden and take out when done. Set to side.

When you’ve used up all your stock, switch to adding your wine (or other liquid) to farro mix, again one cup at a time, waiting for liquid to absorb each time. It usually takes 35 – 40 minutes to cook farro to an al dente soft but not soggy texture. I like a slight chew to my farro.

Add the butter and 2/3 of cheese and stir to a creamy texture. Spoon farro in to serving bowls and spoon mix of squash & mushrooms over the top. Garnish using the remaining shredded cheese.

* You can puree squash and add to farro at the end if you want to have a more squash flavor to the farro.