Cooking with Bruce: Risotto Cake

Been awhile since we had a cooking with Bruce episode, so here's what I made last week.

The original recipe can be found here: Saffron risotto cake with grilled vege

My feeling was the herbs and spices used would overpower the saffron, aside from colouring, I couldn't see it achieving much. So my version, which tasted bloody marvellous, is as follows:

Ingredients
1 onion, finely chopped
olive oil
dill
chives
coriander(fresh)
4 cloves garlic, chopped
chilli flakes
tin of chopped tomatoes
300gm risotto rice
salt and pepper
1/2c white wine
1L stock (see notes)
fresh basil
1 aubergine, thinly sliced
2 courgettes, thinly sliced
125g mozzarella, sliced
1 red pepper roasted and skin removed
parmesan

Cook onion in oil on a low heat until soft, add dill, chives, coriander, chilli, garlic, cook gently. Add tomatoes and rice for five minutes - slightly hotter. Season and add wine (I'm presuming you're drinking already).
Stock: I used the rest of the tin of tomatoes,then topped things up to around 1L with vege stock.
Add stock slowly and let it get absorbed before adding more. When things are ready, rice should be pretty soft, but not collapsing. Add the basil and leave to cool.
Drizzle olive oil over the veges and grill them, should have streaks of blackness, and still be soft. Magic!
Grease baking tin, add 1/3 of the rice, top with courgettes, half the aubergine, mozzarella and peppers, sprinkle with parmesan. Add another 1/3 of rice, remaining vege, cheese, then top with remaining rice.

Bake in a medium oven for 30 minutes, until kinda golden around the top. Not too much tho as the rice will viciously attack your gums as you chew. It's a nasty wee bugger like that.
Nice hot and cold.

Love, B