Here’s a quick and basic appetizer based on an unsourced recipe I had found some time ago.
This recipe makes a ton of mushrooms, but can easily be halved. There’s a lot of room for various substitutions. For example, you could use panko instead of the sourdough breadcrumbs. Whatever you do, though, don’t skip or skimp on the roasted garlic
Adding some finely grated Parmesan or Romano cheese would add a nice, subtle complexity to the overall flavor.
What you’ll need:
- 1 whole medium head garlic—for roasting
- 3T, plus 1t olive oil
- 16 2-inch-diameter mushrooms, wiped clean with a damp cloth
- 1t butter
- 0.75 cups fine fresh sourdough-breadcrumbs
- 1.5t chopped fresh rosemary
- Cooking oil spray
- Fresh rosemary sprigs, optional garnish—this actually seems like a waste of perfectly good rosemary.
What to do:
Use whatever recipe you like for making roasted garlic, or use this one: Heat your oven to 400°F. Peel the papery outer layer from garlic head, and cut off the top 0.33-inch of the head to expose the tops of the cloves. Put the garlic, cut side, up, onto a double-layer of aluminum foil sheet large enough to wrap up the entire head. Drizzle 1-2T of olive oil over the top and wrap up the garlic to hold in the oil. Roast in the oven for about 30 minutes. Then unwrap the top and continue cooking for about 10-15 more minutes. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.
Now for the mushrooms. Snap or cut off the stems, and finely chop them. Heat the butter and 1t of olive oil in a large, heavy frypan—I actually used a nonstick pan, to good effect. Over medium-high heat, add the chopped stems and sauté them until they start to sweat—about 3 minutes. Add the breadcrumbs and stir for about 5 minutes until they are toasted. Stir in the rosemary and remove from the heat.
Remove the roasted garlic cloves from their skins and a mash them up. Keep the oil, too. Mix the reserved oil with 1.5T of the mashed garlic. Stir the garlic into the mushroom/breadcrumb mixture, ensuring that the garlic is evenly distributed. Add a few pinches of salt and pepper.
Heat your oven to 375 degrees F. Now for assembly and baking. Line a large baking sheet with foil and spray it with cooking oil. Brush the mushroom caps with olive oil and place top-down on the baking sheet. Using a small spoon, fill the caps with the mushroom/breadcrumb/garlic mixture. Really pile on as much as you can into each mushroom cap.
Bake the mushrooms for about 20 minutes, until tender.
Serve hot.
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