Fry-ups

Every so often, fortunately not very often, I decide to do a fry-up for dinner. The contents of the fry-up vary, but usually in some way include a meat, a starch, garlic, onions or leeks, mushrooms, and a veggie. Tonight's fry-up involved leeks and mushrooms I had purchases over the weekend for camping -- they needed to be used and used quickly!

And did I add, needed to be fast? I hurt today.

Beefy Leeks and Mushrooms

8 oz beef sirloin cut into cubes
1 large leek cut into coins
8 oz. mushrooms sliced thickly
2 large potatoes
2 cans green beans (I know, but I didn't have fresh -- and I said quick)
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 large tablespoon chopped garlic
1 teaspoon salt

Microwave the potatoes for 4 to 5 minutes, then cube.

Add oil to a large skillet or wok and heat on medium/high. Add potatoes and mushrooms. Saute until halfway done.

Add leeks and garlic. Saute until done.

Remove everything from the pan and saute the steak on high until nearly to desired doneness. Return everything to the pan and add the green beans. Heat until green beans are done.

This was wonderfully savory and amazingly yummy. The dish was mostly vegetable, but tasted very full of meat. And it was fast and easy to make -- about a half hour, from first chop to serving.

I love the interplay of leeks, mushrooms, and beef. That combination is so savory, so umami that I just can't get quite enough of it. In some ways, I prefer leeks to onions; while the taste isn't as sharp, it contains a lot of the freshness I associate with green onions. However, I prefer to go gently with the spicing, simply because I like to let the leeks shine.

Creamy Mushroom Chicken

I love making a dish that is so good you don't mind having it for several meals in a row (i.e. dinners in a row). It's even better if the dish is relatively quick and easy to make. This is one of those dishes.

And *gasp* it doesn't even have garlic!

Creamy Mushroom Chicken

2 - 3 pounds of chicken cut into large cubes
1 pound crimini mushrooms sliced
2 oz dried porcini mushrooms
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 cans cream of mushroom soup
1 cup white wine (preferably sparkling or champagne)
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 1/2 cups water

Chop dried porcinis into very small pieces so they need less time to soak and don't have to be chopped while wet. Soak porcini mushrooms in two cups of boiling water for 10-20 minutes (about as long as it takes you to cut up the chicken and mushrooms and brown them).

Sprinkle salt over chicken chunks and let sit for five minutes.

Heat olive oil in large skillet or everyday pan until olive oil is hot and leggy. Brown chicken and remove from pan. Brown mushrooms and remove from pan.

Deglaze pan with wine. Add mushroom soup one can at a time and whisk thoroughly to combine before adding the next can. Rinse cans out with 4-5 ounces of water. Add porcini fluid and porcinis. Add chicken and mushrooms. Cook until chicken is done.

Serve over rice or noodles.

I used cream of mushroom soup as the base because I didn't want to spend huge amounts of time cooking a sauce down. Between the mushrooms in the soup, the mushrooms I added, and the porcinis, the sauce turned out amazingly rich and full of mushroom-y goodness.

I will confess I used a sparkling white wine because I had some left from dinner the night before. It was nicely crisp and dry without being sour and supported the mushroom flavor wonderfully. I think it also helped the sauce be a bit lighter, though I suspect that was mostly in my mind.

Peas work really nicely as a vegetable to serve with the sauce -- I thawed the peas and mixed them into the sauce on my plate. They gave wonderful little bursts of fresh sweetness in the sauce.

Enjoy!

Mushroom Pork Chops

Several weeks ago, I bought a family pack of pork chops. I divvied them up and froze what I didn't immediately use. Some of the chops were HUGE - like twice the size of a normal pork chop. Easily six inches or more long.

This last weekend I decided to make pork. Of course, I pull out the packaging, thinking it was a roast that I wanted to smother in mushrooms. Oops! I decided I would smother them in mushrooms anyway.

Mushroom-smothered Pork Chops

1 375ml bottle of rose wine
2 cinnamon sticks, broken into small pieces
1/2 teaspoon bruised grains of paradise (if you don't have them, use 1/4 teaspoon cracked black pepper)
3 very, very large pork chops
1 lb mushrooms, sliced thinly
2 teaspoons or so oil (I used my Chardonnay Fumé grapeseed oil.)
1 tablespoon or so sea salt

Marinade pork in wine, cinnamon, and grains of paradise for two hours.

Preheat oven to 325°F (163°C).

Spread some oil on the bottom of the roasting pan. Lay first pork chop in pan. Sprinkle with salt. Spread a little oil on pork chop. Cover with a layer of mushrooms.

Place second pork chop, salt, oil, and cover with mushrooms.

Place third pork chop, salt, and oil. Cover top and sides with remaining mushrooms.

Roast for 2 to 2-1/2 hours.

The mushrooms keep the pork very moist and add tons of flavor. The long, slow roast gelatinizes the connective tissue, giving a really, really rich, unctuous savor to the meat.

This dish is really easy to make but tastes like you had to really work for it. But let's keep how easy it is to ourselves.

Mushrooms and Leeks

I like mushrooms and I like leeks. So the recipe Fungys in Forme of Cury that combines the two is especially appealing. Especially since it contains my favorite spice blend of all time: poudre forte (strong powder). Since I don't rely on a set poudre forte recipe, that meant I could play!

I will warn you up front that the measurements of the spices is only general as I blended these by smell not by measurement. I was looking for a spicing that would help bring out the piquancy of the leeks and support the savoriness of the mushrooms. Also, this recipe can be made up with more or less cooking broth, depending on if you want something like a soup or something more like a side dish.

Mushrooms and Leeks

1 lb crimini mushrooms (portabellos will work too)
1 lb leeks
1 tablespoon (more or less) ginger powder
1/2 tablespoon (more or less) garlic powder
1 teaspoon (more or less) cinnamon powder
1/2 teaspoon (more or less) coriander powder
1/2 teaspoon (more or less) nutmeg powder
1/4 teaspoon (more or less) mace powder
1/4 teaspoon (more or less) cumin powder
1/2 teaspoon (more or less) black pepper
1 teaspoon (more or less) salt
1-2 cups (more or less) chicken broth

Thinly slice the leeks across the grain into coins, between 1/16 and 1/8 of an inch thick. Hint: Slice the leeks then clean them to get the most grit/sand out of them. As you reach the dark green of the outer leaves, remove them and continue slicing the lighter/brighter green of the inner leaves.

Thickly slice the mushrooms, between 1/8 and 1/4 of an inch.

Place leeks and mushrooms in a pan with spices and add broth. If the dish is a side dish, fill with broth to about 2/3 the height of the mushrooms and leeks (you will bet more fluid from the mushrooms as they cook); if the dish will be a soup, make sure the mushrooms and leeks are completely covered with fluid.

Simmer until the mushrooms and leeks are cooked. You want them to cook for the same length of time to allow the flavors to marry and for the mushrooms to become the dominant flavor in the broth.

I liked how the ginger and the garlic helped enhance the sharpness of the leeks and brightened the dish. The cinnamon, cumin, coriander, mace, and nutmeg balanced the sharpness and supported the meatiness of the mushrooms.

This dish is a wonderful low-fat dish. If you used vegetable broth (preferably not tomato-based) to make a vegetarian version, few carnivores would miss the lack of meat. I made three quarts of this for potluck of 150 people and it was gone by the time 3/4 of the people had gotten through the line!

Serve with bread for a satisfying soup.

Stuffed Mushrooms

For years I've made stuffed mushrooms and they were good. Then I got the challenge of making gluten-free foods, so I needed to get a little more creative. So I did. And they were amazing!

In most stuffed mushroom recipes, bread crumbs bind the stuffing together. But when you work gluten-free, bread is right out. So I thought to myself, "What else binds foods together?"

Cheese and egg do quite often. Unfortunately, egg is out because my friend is an lacto-vegetarian and doesn't do eggs. But, done carefully, cheese can bind the stuffing together on its own. Specifically, a mixture of ricotta and mozzarella can.

Unfortunately, they were so good we ate them before I could get any pictures.

Stuffed Mushrooms

9 med. to large crimini mushrooms
4 stalks of asparagus
2 green onions
2 teaspoons minced garlic
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 cup mozzarella cheese
1 cup ricotta cheese
Pepper to taste
Salt to taste

Clean and cut the asparagus and onions into coins. Remove the stalks from the mushrooms; these can be added to the stuffing if desired. Saute asparagus, onions, garlic, and optional mushroom stalks in the olive oil for 5 to 10 minutes. Add salt and pepper. Set aside to cool.

Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).

Place mushrooms stalk side up in a baking pan. Combine the asparagus mixture with the ricotta and 1/3 of the mozzarella. Place in mushrooms. Cover the stuffed mushrooms with the remaining mozzarella. Bake for 20 minutes or until mozzarella begins to brown.

Serve piping hot.

I prefer using crimini mushrooms to using large white buttons. Criminis are sometimes called baby portabellos -- with all that implies. I like the firmer, meatier texture; it gives the stuffed mushrooms more body. Criminis also can handle denser, heavier stuffings. I also prefer the flavor of criminis, richer and more savory than a white mushroom could ever dream of.

The stuffed mushrooms were very cheesy, but quite yummy. The mushrooms were firm and moist, but not soggy. The cheese was, again, nice and firm. I had made ricotta cheese and the flavor just was incredible. I usually use these as an appetizer, popping them in the oven just as the guests arrive.