risotto al Barolo

We had a perfect winter dish last night: risotto al Barolo. The concept is simple: the wonderful arborio rice from Lombardy in northern Italy combined with Piedmont's Barolo wine. Even though we subsituted Piedmont's Dolcetta wine, somewhat less expensive than the luxurious Barolo, the results were at the top of the charts in tastiness and as a perfect winter comfort food.

The basic recipe requires only arborio, meat stock, an onion, olive oil and parmesan, and one and one-half cups of Barolo. There is an alternate, with herbs and ground beef and pancetta that is equally wonderful.

Both recipes, in easy to follow detail, are at "classicpasta.com/risotto". Worth the try.