Fried Rice Balls Stuffed with Mozzarella (Spanish Arancini)

One of the dishes I made for the lunch with friends the other day was some rice balls that my sister-in-law used to make at the restaurant of her rural guesthouse, El Molí del Duc. They're similar to Italian arancini.

In fact, this dish — a starter on her menu — is called "Pilotes del Duc" (the Duke's balls). Funnily enough, now that I write it, I can see it might be misleading.

Making them is really simple.

Ingredients

• 1 onion
• 2 glasses of rice
• 100 ml (a little) crushed tomato
• A cheese that melts well, diced
• 1 egg per 200 g of cooked rice
• Breadcrumbs
• Oil for frying

Method

Start by gently frying a very finely chopped onion. Once it's well softened, add a little crushed tomato and fry for a couple of minutes, then add water and straight away the rice (no need to wait for it to boil). The proportions are one part rice to 1.5 parts water. Stir a little and let it cook for 20 minutes over a low heat, without touching it much. The rice should absorb all the water and end up dry but "sticky".

Once the rice is cooked, take it off the heat and let it cool.

When it's cold, add one egg for every 200 g of rice and a few breadcrumbs, and mix well. It should have a consistency that makes it easy to shape into balls (see the photo).

To make the balls, take a little rice and shape it into a ball, pressing so the rice is compact — a technique similar to making rice balls for sushi. The trick is to put something inside. In my case I used block mozzarella cut into small cubes; my sister-in-law usually uses a stronger-flavoured cheese.

If you make them, bear in mind that mozzarella melts very well, so the inside of the ball will be molten, which is lovely — but you have to eat them straight away, because just as mozzarella melts, it dries out again and turns rubbery. That's what happened to us (although almost nobody noticed).

Once the balls are made, coat the outside with breadcrumbs and fry them in plenty of oil. You'll know they're done when they're a nice golden colour. They come out very crunchy, thanks to the breadcrumbs and the rice.

At El Molí, the Pilotes del Duc are always served with a green pepper jam, and that's what I did too. You'll find the recipe for this simple jam right here.

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