Restaurateur and TV chef Mario Batali has traded risotto Milanese for rice and beans to protest proposed cuts in food stamps.

Batali, his wife and two teenage sons are on a food- stamp diet — $1.48 per meal — for the week.

“I’m . . . starving,” said the beefy Batali, who’s on the board of the relief agency Food Bank for New York City. “Rice and beans is in my lunch every day.”

Congress is eyeing billions of dollars in cuts, which could remove 2 million people from the program.