Down a Rabbit Hole of Mushrooms

 What’s cooking? Crispy Stuffed Mushrooms with Dried Apricots

When I started this post, it was to suggest a meal for Valentine’s Day. I had thought mushrooms had aphrodisiac properties. But do they really? In a word, no. And then the day came and went while my hubby and I battled the 2021 Wicked Winter Storm here in Austin. We had no power in the part of the house that has the guest rooms, and no heat in the part that has our bedroom and bathroom. Sleeping is fine – under a toasty down quilt – and we heated the bathrooms via towel warmers, hoping we could hold off taking showers until the HVAC guys could come.

I’ll still give you this recipe because it’s something different and versatile and a great mix of flavors and textures. The Kitchen Goddess and her mate have dined on it twice now, and made all gone both times. And now that we’ve moved from Valentine’s Day and Lunar New Year to Ash Wednesday and into Lent, these meat-free options for dinner are popular.

I went foraging for mushroom dishes in past blog posts, to take a look at what I’ve already written about mushrooms. I discovered, embarrassingly, that pretty much all the information I had gathered for this post has already appeared. No wonder it all seemed familiar. So. All that stuff about how good they are for you, how to buy them and store them, and even about the different kinds of wild and cultivated fungi, has been presented, perhaps ad nauseum, on these “pages.” If you missed them, here’s a lightning round of mushroom deliciousness from the past.

First, the soups. I’d forgotten how much I love mushroom soup, and here are two – one made with cream and one made without. The first, creamy but cream-free, is Wild Mushroom Soup with Madeira.

Then there’s the creamy version: Crimini Mushroom Soup.

I never get tired of mushrooms combined with pasta. So here’s Pasta with Wild Mushroom Sauce, simple and straightforward.

As with classic Bolognese, this Mushroom Bolognese gets an extra boost of flavor from the veggie base, and its texture is amazingly like ground beef.

I like anything in a rustic tart – so much easier to make than it looks! Here’s my Swiss Chard and Mushroom Tart with Whole Wheat Pastry.

And finally, the easiest – but still delightful – meal possible, is mushrooms on toast. The first shown below is Morel Mushroom Toasts with Parsley Salad; the second – the country mouse version – is   Mushroom Toast. Add a nice salad or veggie and you’re done.

Historically, the season for mushrooms is autumn, but these days, you can find mushroom farmers all over the world, producing plentiful year-round crops, not only of the traditional white button ‘shrooms, but also of criminis (brown button mushrooms), portabellas (just a mature version of the first two, but with a strikingly different texture), and shiitakes (most often in East Asian cuisine). In the past 50 years, farming has extended to oyster mushrooms, enokis, and pioppino mushrooms. And why not? As a crop, they’re profitable, easy to grow, and have a remarkably low impact on the environment. But even wild mushrooms that are difficult to cultivate – like porcini, chanterelle, and hen-of-the-woods – can be found year round these days. My NJ farmers’ market features a guy who forages all over the state during the summer. 

So without further blathering, here’s the recipe that started me down this road: Crispy Stuffed Mushrooms with Apricots – a perfect sweet-savory mix that you can use as an hors d’oeuvre or an entrée. The topping has a tendency to crumble, so when you shop for the mushrooms, you’ll want to focus on how you’ll be serving them. Hors d’oeuvres need to be small enough to take in one bite, whereas the larger mushrooms are deeply satisfying to eat with a fork. Serve as an entrée over egg noodles or rice, with the leftover filling sprinkled as a garnish.

Kitchen Goddess notes on the ingredients:

■ The crinkly texture of the breadcrumbs is essential, so the Kitchen Goddess begs you to get panko crumbs at your grocer, rather than traditional breadcrumbs which have an unfortunate tendency to compact. (Also, panko is lower in calories, fat, and sodium than regular breadcrumbs.) The crispy topping contrasts really nicely with the earthy smoothness of the mushrooms, and the spice mix in the topping adds a wonderful zing.

■ KG’s curbside service delivered a really random assortment of sizes, mostly larger than you would use as hors’d’oeuvres. So you may want to visit the store in person if you need uniform sizes. But we’re not having parties these days anyhow, are we? Just be sure to get mushrooms with stems, as you’ll need the stems for the filling.

■ If you don’t have dried apricots, other dried fruits will also work. Cranberries, craisins, prunes, dates...

Crispy Stuffed Mushrooms with Apricots

Adapted from Melissa Clark in The New York Times

Yield: Serves 2 as entrée, 4 as hors d’oeuvres.

Time: Ms. Clark claims 45 minutes, but that’s if you have minions to chop and measure out ingredients. Without minions, add 30 minutes for the prep.

Ingredients

8-9 ounces crimini (preferred) or button mushrooms
5 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
½ small onion, finely chopped (about ½ cup)
1 garlic clove, minced (about 1 rounded teaspoon)
1 teaspoon Aleppo pepper (or ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper + ¾ teaspoon sweet paprika)

2 tablespoons tomato paste

½ teaspoon kosher salt, more to taste

¼ teaspoon ground cumin (if you like cumin, feel free to add a bit more

½ cup panko bread crumbs

⅓ cup, plus 1 tablespoon grated Parmesan

¼ cup chopped cilantro leaves and tender stems

2 tablespoons chopped dried apricots

1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest

Freshly ground black pepper

Lemon wedges, for serving

Directions

Preheat oven to 400º.

Separate the mushroom stems from the caps and chop the stems.

In a medium-sized skillet (10-inch diameter) over medium heat, add 2 tablespoons olive oil and let it warm up for about 20 seconds, until it thins out. Add the chopped mushroom stems and the onion and cook, stirring often, for 5-7 minutes until the stems are lightly browned and the onion is translucent. Add the garlic, Aleppo pepper, tomato paste, salt, and cumin, and cook, stirring almost constantly, until the tomato paste darkens and the garlic is fragrant, about 1 minute.

Add the panko and 1½ tablespoons olive oil to the mixture and continue to cook, stirring constantly, for 4-6 minutes, until the bread crumbs appear lightly toasted. Watch carefully to make sure the bread crumbs don’t burn. Remove the pan from the heat and scrape the mixture into a medium-sized mixing bowl. Add the ⅓ cup Parmesan, the cilantro, the dried apricots and the lemon zest, and toss well to combine. Taste and season with black pepper and more salt if needed.

Line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper or spray it lightly with PAM. Place the mushroom caps on the pan with cavities facing up. Drizzle the insides of the caps with the remaining 1½ tablespoons olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Using a spoon, stuff the mushroom caps with the seasoned bread-crumb mixture. I found that there’s a lot of filling to be used, but the mushrooms taste best with as much as you can pile on. You can use your fingertips to gently mound the filling together.

Sprinkle the remaining 1 tablespoon of grated Parmesan on the mushrooms. Bake 15-20 minutes, until the tops are crisp and golden. Serve hot or warm, with lemon wedges for squeezing over the tops. If you are serving over rice or lightly buttered noodles, sprinkle the leftover (and there will be some) stuffing around as garnish. 

To make ahead: You can stuff these little darlings as many as 6 hours in advance. If you are making them more than an hour ahead, it’s probably best to cover the tray with cellophane wrap and refrigerate them. If only an hour in advance, you can leave them out.

Bon appétit!