Creamy Mushroom and Leek Risotto (Dairy-Free and Plant-Based)

Are you craving something delicious, healthy, and easy to make? Then this leek and mushroom risotto is everything you need to make on a busy day. It can be done in less than 30 minutes with the freshest of ingredients available at your grocery store.

In most cases, we have people avoid fast-burning carbohydrates, like rice for example. But we understand that in certain situations it can be important to include these ingredients. People undergoing cancer treatments for example, can often find themselves with a low appetite. Adding some rice can be beneficial to make a meal more appetizing. 

To make this savory and creamy mushroom risotto, we decided to use simple, but tasty ingredients. It is dairy-free, gluten-free, plant-based, and delicious. In this recipe, we have included a combination of red onion, leeks, and of course garlic. 

There’s so much to talk about garlic when you want to eat wholesome meals like this one. Garlic is a popular ingredient in cooking due to its unique aroma and delicious taste. 

It also comes with a lot of health benefits that are increased when the garlic clove is chopped, crushed, or chewed. To maximize its anticancer effect, crush the garlic and let it sit for 10 minutes before adding it to the recipe [1]. 

It’s essential not to warm the garlic too much. Warm it for a minute or two just enough to release all of its flavors and then continue adding the rest of the ingredients.

Each risotto recipe is creamy enough to have its title, but we wanted to make it extra creamy and enjoyable by adding some oat milk just at the end of the cooking process. Not only does the oat milk make it creamier, but it also brings the dish to a whole another level with all of the flavors. Cook for only 25 minutes and enjoy! 

For added flavouring, both nutritional yeast for cheesiness and white vinegar can add extra notes of flavor. But this recipe will still taste wonderful without it. 

Here are some of the great cancer fighting ingredients that you will find in our flavorful and mouth watering Creamy Mushroom Risotto. 

• Leek: Provides a rich source of antioxidants, especially polyphenols and sulfur compounds [2]. These extraordinary compounds protect us from environmental and ingested carcinogens by equipping our antioxidant enzymes, enhancing DNA repair pathways, and having a direct effect on the fundamental identifiers of cancer progression and metastasis [3]. 

• Mushroom: The edible and functional properties of mushrooms have been recognized for many years. It is also known to help hormone-sensitive cancers such as breast and prostate cancer by blocking hormone-related enzymes. In breast tissue, an abnormal expression of aromatase is considered to be a risk factor for breast cancer. Mushrooms have phytochemicals that can suppress these aromatase/estrogen biosynthesis. One study stated that out of their seven vegetable extracts tested, the mushroom’s extract was the most effective in inhibiting the activity of human placental aromatase activity thus helping greatly in the prevention and diffusion of cancer [4]. 

Make sure to give this delicious recipe a try. For someone that would rather avoid fast-burning carbohydrates like rice, we have other nutritious and tasty recipes that are low carb, ketogenic, and slow carb in nature. 

And for those of you on a ketogenic diet, you can also replace the risotto rice with cauliflower rice. Just add it at the end and cook it for a short amount of time only. This way you can maintain the rice-like texture. Enjoy!

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