THE RECIPES

Ingredients:

320 g San Bernardino Vialone Nano Rice

150 g mozzarella cheese

800 g pureed tomatoes

200 g frozen peas

1 carrot

2 shallots

1 celery stick

vegetable stock

½ glass white wine

40 g parmesan

e.v. olive oil

basil

salt

pepper

Method:

Start by making the sauce, which will be used to flavour the rice. Put two spoonfuls of extra virgin olive oil into a non-stick pan and gently fry a finely sliced onion until it turns golden. Add the finely diced carrots and celery stick. In the meantime, clean and dice a peeled aubergine and add it to the other ingredients in the pan. Salt to taste. After about 10 minutes, pour in the pureed tomatoes. 

Aromatize the sauce with a few hand-torn basil leaves and let it cook on a medium-low heat for about half an hour. Should the sauce taste too sharp, add a teaspoon of sugar. In the meantime, put the mozzarella in a strainer to drain off its excess liquid; then slice it very finely to ensure that it melts more easily when cooking.

Put plenty of water in a fairly large saucepan and bring it to the boil. Throw in the rice, add salt and cook it for the amount of time indicated on the packet. In this case, it is advisable to opt for a variety that is suitable for risotto, arancini or supplì (rice balls), enabling the grains to adhere together after being oven baked. When the rice is cooked, strain and season it with a knob of butter and black pepper to taste.

Leave the rice to cool for about twenty minutes and then dress it with a copious ladle of sauce. Mix well and start to arrange the layers of timbale in an oven dish, previously greased with butter and lined with greaseproof paper. Lay the first layer of rice, cover it with mozzarella slices, sprinkle with plenty of parmesan cheese and finally cover with the aubergine sauce. Continue in this way until all the ingredients have been used up.

Before putting the timbale in the oven, sprinkle it with a generous handful of grated cheese and a few dots of butter. Bake in a preheated oven at 180°C for half an hour. Leave it to rest for at least 15 minutes before serving. In this way, the timbale will settle and firm up, making it much easier to remove from the dish. Turn the timbale upside down on a serving dish and garnish with a few basil leaves.