A perfect romantic dinner date, Valentine’s dinner for two or a dinner party, just double or triple the quantities for the amount of people you are feeding. This easy risotto tastes delicious and before you think it’s too expensive to cook, I got a frozen lobster for £5.00 from Lidl at the time of writing this. However, my latest update (November 2020) is I recently got one for £6.00 from Morrison’s. It’s a bit of work getting the meat out, but after that it’s easy. For the stock, I can’t praise Knorr fish stock pots highly enough. You would be hard pushed to make a better stock and they are a store cupboard essential round in my kitchen.

Serves 2.

Ingredients:

1 lobster, thawed if frozen
1 tablespoon of olive oil
2 shallots finely chopped
180g risotto rice
Pinch of saffron
450ml rich fish stock
2 garlic cloves minced
A small bunch parsley finely chopped
1/4 cup of rosé wine
Lemon wedges and zest to serve (optional)
Double cream or butter (optional)
Salt and pepper to taste
a wedge of lemon (optional)

How:
Preheat the oven to 200°C.
Put olive oil in an oven proof pan with a lid and gently sautée the shallots, garlic and saffron.
Cut the lobster in half with a big knife and remove the meat from the shell (I use the back of a knife to crack the shell open on the claws).
Chop the lobster meat (reserving the main body meat for placing on top later, I sometimes leave it in the half shell as it looks great) put in the pan with the rice, stock and wine. To cook it on top of the stove, add the rice and sauté in the pan with the sautéed shallots, then add a ladle of the stock and stir till it has nearly all been absorbed by the rice, repeat the is till the rice is cooked, then stir in the chopped lobster meat, the cream and butter if using, check for seasoning and put on two plates with the lobster tail and sprinkle with parsley and serve straight away with a wedge of lemon.
Baked version
Put in oven with the lid on and bake for 30 minutes putting the reserved lobster meat on top for the last five minutes. If you aren’t dairy free then you can at this point mix in a knob of butter or a splash of double cream (or both). Check for seasoning. 
Put the risotto onto two plates and place the lobster half on top. Add the lemon wedges for squeezing on the side of the plates and sprinkle the lemon zest and parsley over to serve. Serve straight away.