linguine with mushrooms

So for this meal I started off with some intriguing spinach and chive linguine courtesy of Trader Joe's.  I'm sure you could make it with regular linguine, but I'd amp up the seasonings to account for that.


ingredients

• pack of linguine
• chopped baby bella mushrooms
• a zuchinni
• fresh baby spinach
• crushed garlic
• olive oil
• crushed chili flakes
• salt/pepper
• grated sharp white cheddar to top
  

  

  

  

Above you'll see the pre- and post-cooked goodness of the veggies.  The whole mess looked less appealing when dumped on top of the pasta and covered in cheese, but I can assure you it was delicious.  I won't give instruction on this, basically chop, simmer/boil and serve.  If it seems too dry, add more olive oil.  

tasty dishes

So what we have here is a tasty meal composed of Rachel's chana masala, some pecan rice, the mushroom/carrot dish we came up with and then my signature salad. It quartered nicely on the plate. For the next two nights I had the same thing minus the mushroom dish since we hadn't made enough of that, and I'd definite reccomend it. If I could spell recommend. Reccomend?

carrots, mushrooms, coriander

A simple sidedish.

ingredients

• chopped baby portobella mushrooms
• three big carrots
• a handful of fresh coriander/cilantro
• a spoonful of crushed garlic
• season with cardamon, pepper, salt
• olive oil
  

Chip, simmer, season, serve.

mushroom fritters

So these fritters came about one evening when I'd invited Jeanette for dinner and wanted to make something with mushrooms because mushroom-hating JaBootaay was out of town.  We went through loads of my cook books, nothing was quite right or we didn't have the ingredients until we saw some write-up on corn fritters with a mushroom variation from Bittman's tome.  

 

ingredients

• 16 mushrooms (button mushrooms were on sale, that's what we used)
• 4 spring onions
• liberal handfuls of fresh parsley
  
• 1.5 cups wheat flour
• 1 egg
• 1 cup of milk
• teaspoon of baking soda
• salt and pepper to taste
  

 

So I started by chopping mushrooms and spring onions.  Jeanette made a batter with two cups of wheat flour, some baking soda, an egg and some milk.  The amount of mushrooms should seem a lot in comparison to the batter, maybe a 2:1 ratio.  It all got served together, so we had balls of mushrooms/onion held together by batter.  These balls get dropped into a couple of inches of oil like this:

Using wheat flour meant it was a little harder to tell when the fritters had "browned" but you can still pretty much just tell when they're done.  Basically just have about 4 on the go at a time.  Your yield should be about 20 or so.  I'd encourage you to make them not that big or they won't cook through.  Also, we served them without a dipping sauce, but I would definitely make up either a marinara or a chutney to serve these with.  They had a nice moist center, and a good one-two flavour punch from the batter and then the mushrooms.  We plated with the second zucchini au gratin I made, and overall they were a good pairing.

Marinated and Cheese Stuffed Mushrooms

For Thanksgiving Eve I made some marinated and cheese stuffed mushrooms. I almost made either marinated or cheese stuffed mushrooms, but I decided to combine my recipes and see how they turned out. I enjoyed them!


I bought 2 packs of "stuffing mushrooms"... yes, stuffing mushrooms. I have never noticed mushrooms by that name but they clearly served their purpose. On Tuesday night I prepared the marinade... something along the lines of:

1c water
1/2c oil
1/2c red wine vinegar
chopped/minced garlic
spices of choice: oregano, thyme, pepper

Simmer ingredients and then add mushrooms (remember to remove the stalk). Bring to a boil for a few minutes. Allow to cool and store overnight in the refrigerator.

After the mushrooms have been in the marinade overnight, remove and place in a pan or on a cookie sheet. I placed them snugly in a pan so they wouldn't slide around. Stuff with your choice of cheese. I chose brie because it is soft and easy to ball up to fit right inside the mushroom.

Place in oven on a moderate temperature (350-ish) for about 20 minutes.

Optional: garnish with paprika, or use chili powder by accident like I did (hey, they are the same color).