Fourteen years ago I created a recipe that has been a great success over the years. Here’s the original:

Tonight, amidst pouring rain outside, I made it again for dinner. The dish I made was close to the original. It did not have the benefit of Moroccan eggplant jam, and we had no small tomatoes We did have sun-dried tomatoes, so I substituted those. Instead of the roasted vegetable stock, I substituted a watered-down, rich mushroom broth, made and frozen a couple of weeks ago. And I set a resolution to make the eggplant jam one day in the near future. Accompanied by a Lugana from the Lake Garda region of Italy, it was every bit as good as the original.

My take-aways from the experience were twofold: (1) Vialone Nano is the best risotto rice, and (2) mozzarella in risotto is every bit as good as Parmigiano or Pecorino, and it’s a nice change of pace. Another benefit is that the mozzarella will help me make Arancini tomorrow, because the rice kernels will hold together better.