mushrooms

Japanese-style vegan mushroom rice: Kinoko no takikomi gohan revisited

maki — Fri, 09 Nov 2007 19:27:00 +0100

The very first full recipe I posted on Just Hungry almost 4 years ago was Mushroom Rice (kinoko no takikomi gohan), and it still gets a lot of visits and comments, even though there’s no photo to whet the reader’s appetite or anything.

The original recipe called for traditional dashi stock made from bonito (fish) flakes, and suggested adding chicken and other things. This version is a lot simpler to assemble and it’s all vegan, but it’s just as tasty. And it comes with a photo! (My early photos on the site are pretty awful. I like to think I’ve learned a little since then.) I am using this in an upcoming bento, but it’s good for regular dinner too, so it’s posted here. It’s actually the best when it’s freshly made - the aroma of the mushrooms fills the kitchen, quite irresistible if you love mushrooms as I do. It is a very autumn (fall) kind of dish.

I think that this dish reflects my changing tastes and eating habits too, not to mention how I approach writing for Just Hungry, too. 4 years ago, I wasn’t that worried about health issues or anything of that nature in regards to food. Now, I am rather proud that I have a tasty dish that is sugar-free, gluten-free (if you use a gluten-free soy sauce), and vegan! I feel a bit trendy.

(The original recipe is not that unhealthy or anything, but it does have a bit of meat, sugar, and so on.)

Vegan mushroom rice (kinoko no takikomi gohan)

2 large dried shiitake mushrooms
1 piece kombu seaweed (optional), left whole (6 inches / 15 cm or so)
2 cups white Japonica rice (sushi rice)
1 piece (about 2 cm / 1 inch long) of fresh ginger, finely chopped
1 cup sliced or shredded mixed mushrooms - fresh shiitake, morels, chantarelles, chestnut mushrooms, or whatever is around
1-2 Tbs. soy sauce
1 Tbs. sake

Equipment suggested: a rice cooker

Soak the dried shiitake mushrooms in plenty of water, with the piece of kombu seaweed. You can soak more than the two you’ll use in this recipe and use the others in other dishes - they will keep in the water, in the refrigerator, well covered, for a few days.

Take out the two shiitake from the soaking liquid, squeezing out the excess. Cut off the hard stem and slice up the caps. Mix together with the chopped ginger and fresh mushrooms, and sprinkle on the soy sauce and sake. Squeeze the mushrooms with your hands until the fresh ones wilt. Leave for a bit.

In the meantime, wash the rice.

Put the rice in the rice cooker bowl, and add the mushroom mix. Add enough of the mushroom soaking liquid to come up to the 2-cup level. Let the rice soak for at least an hour - set the rice cooker timer accordingly.

When the rice is done fluff up with a rice paddle. Serve right away or in bento. It freezes well too.

This makes about 5-6 cups of mixed rice (depending on how much mushrooms you put in, and what kind - maitake or chantarelles would shrink a lot more than, say, eringi (pleurotus)), enough for 2 bento rounds for two plus for dinner.

Notes

I normally use white rice for mixed rice (takikomi gohan) like this, because I think the flavors permeate the rice better than with brown rice. I don’t worry about the lack of fiber content in the rice itself, because the added ingredients usually have lots of fiber anyway.

Romancing the truffle in Richerenches, Provence

maki — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 18:31:40 +0100

Originally published on December 9, 2006: We won't be able to go to Provence this winter because of work, but I still dream about it, and plan for the next trip hopefully in the spring. Here is an article from our trip last year, about a wonderful truffle market in northern Provence. I hope you enjoy it!

The lady vendor with the intense blue gaze and the black beret on her head looks a little like a French Resistance worker from an old movie. She gestures with her hands as she talks, occasionally taking one of her wares gently in her slender fingers. Around her a curious group of people gathers, looking and sniffing intently, asking questions. I slowly inch my way to the front and look into the bowl, then up to her face, my meager French deserting me. She smile and tells me to pick one.

I choose a modestly small one, a tad bigger than a golf ball, too shy to touch one of the big, multi-lobed ones. I take it to my nose, and inhale. I wish that at this point I had more poetic words to describe the sensation, but the only thing I can say is "Wow". That pungent aroma is so unique that it's impossible to articulate. Earthy? Slightly gamey? It's just what it is - truffle.

We are at the Marché aux Truffes in Richerenches, a tiny village tucked away in a corner of the Drôme, the north western part of Provence. For most of the year it's off the beaten track, barely visited by outsiders. But every Saturday morning from November to March, it is one of the most important destinations for lovers of that expensive and pungent tuber. It's the largest truffle market in Provence, and is said to be the largest in terms of quantity of truffles traded in Europe.

Just walking around the market it's hard to tell that it's so important at first glance. The main market is just a few tables set up along the main street in the middle of the village, and of those only a couple are actually selling truffles or truffle-related items. The rest are selling the usual market things like fresh vegetables, juices, cheese and cured meats.

We've heard though that the main drag is not where the real action takes place. Sure enough, at the end of the road is a tree-covered parking lot filled with small white vans.

The parking lot under the old plane trees, where most of the serious truffle action takes place

There are little groups of people huddled together, heads down, whispering closely. There are some men leaning into the back of a van, deep in discussion. I feel that I shouldn't be trying to photograph them up close, so I put the camera away and stroll through the parking lot, trying to look as casual as possible. I catch glimpses of small cloth and plastic bags weighted down at the bottom, of hands coming out of pockets with black clumps in them. Wads of currency are being pulled out and passed from hand to hand.

It all feels very clandestine. I'm not really sure if it is actually that, since it's not like the people are totally hiding what they are doing. It's clearly a strictly cash-only trade, in any case.

I once read somewhere that the buying and selling of truffles appeals strongly to the French character - it's expensive, rare, something delicious to eat, and not quite legal since much of it is cash-only, under the table. (There were a few policemen hovering around the main market street, but they seemed to be there for general security. There must be quite a few euros being carried around there.) I am sure that the intrigue and secrecy simply adds to the appeal of the truffle.

Some Richerenches market goers enjoying some wine..maybe they're celebrating a good day of truffle selling...

I wish that I had the guts to go up to one of the sellers and ask to see their wares, but...well I don't. Instead, I get my truffles from one of the open and above-board market street stalls. The truffle stalls are all selling the black knobbly fungi for the same price: €500 per kilo. That may seem like a staggering price, but it is somewhat cheaper than one might pay elsewhere. Since a little truffle goes a long way, it doesn't feel too outrageous. (For what it's worth, matsutake, a fungus that is highly prized in Japan, can cost 5 to 10 times that.)

Cleaning, preparing and eating the truffle

The final objective is to actually consume these black lumps of mystery and aroma, which I proceed to do as soon as we're back at our rented house. (This is why I love to stay in rented houses or apartments nowadays when I travel, as I've explained here before in my Food Lover's Guide to Provence series - I love the chance to try out freshly acquired ingredients right away!) I'd never cooked with fresh, whole truffles before this, but it is less intimidating than I'd thought. The two modest sized truffles I've purchased (legitimately) came with a small pamphlet explaining how to handle them. Following the instructions, I carefully brush off as much of the fine dirt clinging to the outsides as I can with a damp paper towel. As I rub the surface, the aroma becomes even stronger - it's almost overwhelming.

I don't have a truffle slicer, but the elegant silver ones on sale at the market look very much like a vegetable peeler or cheese slicer to me, so I tackle a truffle with a humble stainless steel peeler. This works quite well. The texture is firm, quite unlike other fungi, and rather buttery. Each slice seems to release even more aroma, which fills the kitchen, drawing in appreciative sniffers.

For my first meal, I shave one truffle lavishly over freshly cooked tagiatelle that's been tossed in a little butter and a few drops of truffle oil. It feels wildly extravagant (though if you think about it, one truffle costs less than a mediocre meal at a restaurant.) This accompanies some magret du canard for dinner. It's rare that a duck breast plays a supporting role but in this case the truffled pasta is the star, drawing oohs and aahs of appreciation as each diner puts their heads into their plates and inhales.

The next day, I make a Pommes Anna with truffle slices scattered between layers. I had something like this some years ago at the Restaurant Buerehiesel in Strasbourg, the first time I'd had a dish with serious chunks of real truffle, and have never forgotten it. This was an even bigger hit than the truffled pasta. The bland butteriness of the potato is a perfect vehicle for the truffle aroma and texture.

Pommes Anna with truffles

To serve 4-6 people as a side dish, or 2 as a luxurious feast

about 8 medium-large firm boiling type potatoes (not fluffy baking potatoes; in the U.S. Yukon Golds would be perfect, in the U.K. Maris Pipers; in Europe Charlottes or Bintjes would be good. I used Charlottes.)
2 Tbs. light olive oil
2 Tbs. butter
1 Tbs. truffle oil
1 medium or 2 small truffles
crunchy sea salt and freshly ground pepper

Preheat the oven to 150°C / 300°F.

Heat the oils and butter in a small pan just until the butter is melted.

Slice the truffle thinly (but not too thinly) with a slicer or a vegetable peeler.

Peel the potatoes and put them in a bowl of water as you work. Slice the potatoes as thinly as you can. Layer the potatoes into a round casserole dish, and sprinkle each later with a little salt and pepper and a drizzle of the combined oils. Every few layers, sprinkle on some of the truffle slices. Continue until all the potatoes are used up, then drizzle on the rest of the oils. Finish up with any remaining truffle.

Bake for an hour in the oven, until a knife stuck in the middle goes through easily and the top is golden brown. Serve immediately.

If you can't get a hold of fresh truffles, try this just with some good quality truffle oil to get the aroma experience.

Dried vegetables: Kiriboshi daikon, hoshi shiitake, and more (OJFTMHYLW no. 3)

maki — Thu, 18 Jan 2007 16:17:28 +0100

At some time in the past. all our ancestors must have relied on drying as a means of preserving food, especially vegetables. Unfortunately most of these have disappeared from our tables in the West except for grains and legumes. (See note at the end of this article for some exceptions.)

Not so on in many Asian countries, including Japan. A number of dried vegetables have survived to modern times and are eaten on a regular basis. (So are many kinds of dried fish, but that's for another article.) Most of these aren't that readily available outside of Japan, but a few are. Of these, kiriboshi daikon (dried shredded daikon radish) and hoshi shiitake (dried shiitake mushrooms) are probably the most popular, and are usually on the shelves of Japanese grocery stores. Both are very high in fiber and low in calories, and make great additions to various dishes.

Dried shiitake mushrooms are a real powerhouse of flavor. When mushrooms are dried, the flavor gets concentrated and the texture changes - they're not an inferior version of the fresh kind, just different. Some people prefer dried shiitake to the fresh kind for cooking. They have about 3.5 grams of fiber per 100 grams, plus iron, potassium and vitamins B1 and B2. (100 grams contains about 200 calories, but that's about 20 mushrooms!)

Shiitake can take a rather long time to reconstitute. What I do is to put a few in a jar or a plastic container with lid, fill it up with water, and put it in the refrigerator for later use. Soaked mushrooms stored like this can be used for a few days. The soaking liquid can be used as a stock in soups and so on. (For a great vegetarian dashi stock, soak a piece of kombu seaweed along with a few dried shiitake.)

To use the shiitake, squeeze well and cut off the hard stem. The stems can be put back in the soaking liquid to extract more flavor out of them.

The flavor of dried shiitake can vary a lot, so try to find a good brand and stick to it. Good dried shiitake should be very fragrant when you open the bag.

Kiriboshi daikon or dried, shredded daikon radish may be less familiar. White daikon radish is shredded into strips then dried (traditionally in the sun). The drying process brings out the sweetness, and concentrates the fiber and mineral content. 100 grams contains 6.6g of fiber and 94 mg of calcium, plus vitamins B1 and B12 and iron, with only about 20 calories. Since a good handful is enough for most recipes, it's almost no calories at all.

It's rather smelly in its dried form, which can be rather off-putting, but the smell goes away once it's soaked and drained. It can be reconstituted either by soaking in cold water for about an hour then rinsed, or by blanching in boiling water for a couple of minutes. Drain away the soaking or blanching water and rinse before using. It's quite neutral in flavor, and takes on the flavors of whatever you cook it in or with like a sponge.

It's fairly easy to make your own kiriboshi daikon: just shred up a daikon into long strips, spread out on a basket and dry in the sun for a couple of days (easier in the summer of course), or in a food dehydrator if you have one.

There are many other dried vegetables eaten in Japan. The one that you may have had already is kanpyo, or dried gourd strips. This is the brown, sweet stuff you see in some sushi rolls. Kanpyo is often sold pre-cooked in vacuum sealed foil or plastic packets. Besides as sushi rolls they are used for tying up little bags of aburaage (fried bean curd) filled with various things and so on. Do be aware though that the kanpyo used in sushi rolls is sweet because sugar is used in the cooking process.

Other dried vegetables included dried greens such as komatsuna and dried chopped green onion. And of course there are those dried mystery vegetables included in instant ramen and cup noodles... (but no, ramen is not good for weight loss.)

Recipe: Stewed Kiriboshi Daikon with shiitake, carrot and aburaage (Kiriboshi daikon no nimono)

This is the most traditional and popular way to cook kiriboshi daikon. It's usually served in small quantities as a side dish. The only notable calories in this come from the aburaage, which is deep fried, though you get rid of much of the surface oil with the blanching. It's packed with fiber. You can also add some hijiki to this if you like. If you use a vegetarian dashi stock this becomes a vegan dish.

Makes 4 side dishes.

1 large handful of dried kiriboshi daikon
2 dried shiitake mushrooms
1 small carrot
1 large piece of aburaage
1 tsp. dashi stock granules + 1/2 cup water (or equivalent amount of freshly made dashi stock)
1 1/2 Tbs. soy sauce
1 Tbs. mirin
1/2 Tbs. sugar or sweetener of your choice

Soak the shiitake mushrooms for at least an hour in water. Cut off the stems and slice thinly.

Blanch the kiriboshi daikon in rapidly boiling water for about 3 minutes. Drain and cut into pieces if they look too long.

Finely julienne the carrot.

Put the aburaage in a bowl and pour some boiling water it. Take out and rinse briefly. This gets rid of a lot of the surface oil it was fried in. Cut into small pieces.

Put the dashi stock, water, soy sauce, mirin and sugar in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Add all the other ingredients, and cook over medium high heat, stirring occasionally, until most of the liquid is gone.

Can be served hot or at room temperature.

Recipe: Kiriboshi daikon and baby arugula salad with lemon dressing

This salad takes advantage of the neutral flavor and chewy-crispy texture of the kiriboshi daikon. You can keep this marinating in the refrigerator until dinner, then toss together with the arugula leaves.

Makes two servings.

1 large handful of dried kiriboshi daikon
1 Tbs. extra virgin olive oil
Juice of 1 small lemon (about 2 Tbs.)
1/2 tsp. honey
Salt and pepper
2 to 3 large handfuls of baby arugula leaves

Blanch the kiriboshi daikon in rapidly boiling water for about 3 minutes. Drain and rinse under cold water. Drain well. Cut up if the pieces look too long to you.

Mix together the oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper and honey. Add the kiriboshi daikon and mix well. Ideally, let marinate in the refrigerator for at least an hour, though you can eat it right away if you're in a hurry.

Taste and adjust the salt and pepper if necessary. Toss well with the arugula leaves before serving.

Note: There are some dried vegetables still in regular use in European cooking, besides grains and legumes. Dried porcini mushrooms are used in Italy for instance. In Switzerland they have dried green beans, which are usually cooked in a soup or together with a ham and things like that. I don't know of any other dried vegetable products in regular use in Europe or the Americas but if you know of any, please let me know! If we get really serious about eating locally produced food, perhaps we'll see a revival of dried veggies (though I somehow doubt this in this modern age of instant gratification...). You can experiment with drying your own vegetables...for me it's been a bit hit or miss, but blanched green beans dry pretty well in a dehydrator, and dried zucchini slices are rather interesting. (This is only worthwhile if you have a vegetable garden and end up with a bumper crop.)

A further education in truffles

maki — Mon, 18 Dec 2006 23:53:04 +0100

A few days after visiting the truffle market in Richerenches, we were staying in the medieval town of Uzès in the Gard. While the Gard is technically part of the Languedoc region, it feels very much like Provence.

On one corner of the ancient arcaded Place aux Herbes in the center of town is a small, jewel-like store dedicated to regional delicacies in general, and the truffle in particular. There we got a further education in the black truffle.

The store itself is a bit overwhelming. Row upon row of truffle-related products line the shelves: truffle oils; truffles preserved in jars; risotto mixes with truffles; cured ham that had been soaked in truffle juice; vacuum packet filet mignon scented with white Italian Alba truffles. And holding a place of honor on the back counter is a footed glass jar, filled with truffles.

We waited our turn patiently as Monsieur Balmain, the proprietor, held forth on the finer points of truffles with a prior customer. The gentleman in question, elegantly dressed in black from head to toe, purchased a truffle about the size of a tennis ball. It cost around €250 (about US $325).

When our turn came, Monseiur Balmain started off by taking the cover off the glass jar and inviting us to sniff. The smell was so overwhelming we almost fell over backwards. It was much more intense than the ones at Richerenches which were out in the open air. The truffles were uniformly larger, more swollen. They seemed to seethe with a mysterious energy in the dimly lit store.

In rapid-fire French (which I got maybe half of) Monseiur Balmain gave us a quick education on how to spot a good truffle. He took one of the precious truffles, and sliced off a tiny sliver. Look at the cut surface, he urged us. Notice how it's almost all dark, with barely a trace of white. He then took a smaller truffle from a plastic container, wrapped in a paper towel, and sliced a sliver off of that too. The slice was noticeably different - it was marbled with fine pale lines. This, he said, is a Chinese truffle. It has little scent, and is spongy. He demostrated the sponginess by pressing on the side of the small truffle, then handed it to me. I pressed - it was indeed a bit soft. And now press this he said, handing me the bigger, blacker truffle. It was much firmer. He told us, If you are offered a truffle in a parking lot, be sure to have a small slice cut off like so so you can see. We nodded meekly, our eyes glued to the black lumps of fungus more expensive than gold.

Now came the time to decide - buy a truffle, or not? There really was no question...we couldn't leave without one. We selected one about the size of a newborn baby's fist, and handed it carefully to Monsieur Balmain, who put it on the electronic scale. We held our breath as the price was figured out. Fortunately it was under the amount of cash we had (though about twice the price of the small truffle we had bought in Richerenches. That one was just a bit more marbled than the all-black truffle, with a few white streaks.)

The Uzès truffle is now resting, as per Monsieur Balmains instructions, in a jar in our refrigerator, wrapped in a paper towel, waiting for its star turn.

Maison de la Truffe
27 place aux Herbes
30700 Uzès
Tel. 04 66 63 83 45 Open year round (Note: the main market day in Uzès is Saturday, and it's a treat)

Produce: Mushrooms, on the wild side

maki — Wed, 04 Oct 2006 16:57:11 +0200

One crisp day in the fall when I was about 12, my cousins and I went for a foraging hike in the forests of the Okuchichibu mountains with our Aunt Naoko. (Relatives of another aunt had a farm there.) We were looking for wild rakkyou (a kind of wild onion), fuki (coltsfoot), and whatever wild mushrooms we could find. We found plenty of rakkyou, but had no luck with mushrooms, until we suddenly came upon a clearing full of brown caps. They were big, luscious shiitake mushrooms, growing on rotted logs.

"Wow, can this be real?" we asked ourselves. "Is this really wild? Doesn't it belong to someone?" I don't know why the fact that they were growing on sawed logs didn't tip us off, but somehow we assumed - Aunt Naoko as well as us kids - that they were wild, and proceeded to pick more than half of them.

Later on, the relatives at whose farm we were staying got an angry phone call from a neighbor. Those shiitake were indeed being farmed. Oops. I think my aunt settled it by paying for what we'd picked...it couldn't have been cheap, because the four of us came away from that clearing with a big bag full each. They were sure delicious though!

I'm not sure if the memory of that afternoon is why I love mushrooms so much. When I say wild mushrooms, I'm talking about mushrooms that are not the old, boring white button mushrooms, even though some of the 'wild' mushrooms are cultivated, especially shiitake. Some of the mushrooms you'll see at the markets right now are gathered wild - fall is the perfect time for them, when the weather turns cool and moist.

There many different kinds of mushrooms, and the variety depends on where you live. The photo here is a sampling of the mushrooms available at the "mushroom man" stall at the Wednesday market in the Zürich main station. You may recognize the brown capped shiitake (top left) and bright yellow chanterelles (top right). The big sliced ones in the bottom right are wild porcini, called Steinpilz here, and the big, white one on the left is an oyster mushroom or Krauterseitling (pleurotus eryngii). In the middle is a mixture of thin, delicate mushrooms that are just called wild mushrooms. They are similar to the chanterelles in texture.

The method of cooking depends on the texture of the mushroom. Meaty, substantial mushrooms like mature porcini or the gigantic 'puffs' you can get in some places can stand up to grilling and frying, but delicate chanterelles will fall apart if you cook them too long. If you're doing a mixed mushroom dish, start cooking the meatier varieties before the thinner ones, or slice them thinly. Instead of slicing mushrooms, it can also be fun to just shred them apart with your hands.

I like to cook mushrooms in two ways: Japanese, and European. With Japanese methods you don't add any fat. European methods usually require quite a lot of butter or oil, but it's worth it of course. The better or more fragrant the mushroom, the simpler the method used to prepare them.

Cleaning mushrooms

Ideally you do not want to wash mushrooms at all, and do not ever soak them. If you must wash them, do so under running water, and immediately dry them off. The more delicate the mushroom, the more they will be damaged by water-washing.

I like to clean them gently with a moist and well-wrung out kitchen towel, and I cut off any impossibly dirty bits, like the root end of maitake mushrooms.

Mushroom foraging

Don't, unless you really know what you are doing. Many mushroom picking courses are offered around this time of year, and can be great fun (though dress warmly - you will get very cold).

Recipes

Some of my favorite mushroom recipes are already on the site:

Mushroom rice, or kinoko takikomi gohan - mushrooms are marinated briefly then cooked with rice. Fat free! (ok, you get some calories from the rice.) We tried this recently with spelt instead of rice, and it was really good.
Mushroom lemon soup - made with wild mushrooms, this is much better than the version with button mushrooms.
Melange of mushrooms soup - A lot of cream in this, and totally worth it.

Japanese style steam-baked mushrooms

This is my mom's favorite way to cook mushrooms, and it's almost ridiculously easy.

An assortment, or just one variety, of mushrooms, such as shiitake, chanterelles, maitake (hen of the woods), etc.
Soy sauce
Sake
Sansho pepper (if you can get it)

Pre-heat the oven to 400°F/200°C. (You can also use a toaster oven for this.)

Clean the mushrooms; cut off any tough or dirt-filled stems. (You'll need to do this for big shiitake and maitake, but not for chanterelles).

Shred or slice any thick, meaty mushrooms. I like to keep shiitake and chanterelles whole, and just shred maitake up into chunks.

Place the mushrooms on a large sheet of aluminum foil.

Sprinkle with sake and soy sauce - about 1 tablespoon of each for two large handfuls of mushrooms - and toss. Sprinkle with sansho.

Wrap the mushrooms up in the foil, and seal around the edges. Place in the oven and bake for about 15 minutes.

You can also make individual serving size packs which can be opened up by each person. The wonderful aroma that wafts up into your nostrils when you rip into the pack is amazing.

Mushroom pasta

Again, this is very very simple, but that's really the best way to enjoy mushrooms when they are at their best. The subtle sourness of the crême fraiche really accentuates the mushroom flavor. You can add some freshly grated Parmesano if you want, but try it without first.

If you can afford it, try this just with chanterelles.

1 pack fresh fettucine (8 oz or 225g)
10 oz / 250g (or so) wild mushrooms, ideally chanterelles
1 tsp fresh thyme leaves, or dried thyme
2 cloves garlic
2 Tbs. unsalted butter
3 Tbs. crême fraiche
Salt and pepper

Start boiling the water for your fresh pasta.

Finely slice the garlic. Start sautéing them in the butter in a pan, until they turn tender.

Clean and slice or rip apart your chosen mushrooms.

When the water has come to a full boil, toss the mushrooms into the pan, toss rapidly over high heat, until it all starts to wilt and brown and emanate a wonderful smell. Add the thyme, and the crême fraiche. Season with salt and pepper.

In the meantime, put the fresh pasta in the boiling water - it should cook in a couple of minutes.

Drain (a little moisture should still be clinging to the noodles), and add to the pan with the mushrooms. Toss well and serve immediately.

Masterchef challenge day 23: Tarragon Chicken and Spinach pie, Mushroom Lemon Soup

maki — Tue, 07 Mar 2006 10:57:06 +0100

Despite being discouraged by the previous day's ingredients, day 23 revived my interest. The ingredients are:

Puff pastry
Spinach
Brie cheese
Leeks
Wild mushrooms
Pear
Chicken breast

Now, I have not bought readymade puff pastry in years. I have this general philosophy that certain very rich foods should only be consumed in its best possible incarnations, because the taste has to be worth the caloric sacrifice one makes. Things like pastries, cakes, ice cream and fois gras fall into this category. The last time I had something made with storebought puff pastry, it was flaky all right, but had a rather dry texture and a very slight acrid, chemical undertone. It had none of the buttery, unctuous goodness that a proper puff pastry should have.

Nevertheless I went to the store to discover what is out there in readymade pastry land, and was pleasantly surprised to discover one that has real butter in it. I know, I am probably way behind the times in this arena. I don't think this will convince me to buy more readymade pastry, but for those of you who are similarly snobbish about pastry but are afraid or too time constrained to make your own, you should know that decent stuff is out there now.

What to make with this pastry? I did ponder doing something sweet, but once again faced with a totally out-of-season fruit (pears and March do not even belong in the same sentence) I decided to do a savory freeform pie. Savory pies are called pastete in Switzerland. This one is filled with chicken that has been gently cooked in a creamy-leeky sauce flavored with fresh tarragon, layered with simply sautéed spinach.

The creamy filling went marvelously with the tender, buttery crust. Consumed for Sunday lunch, it disappered with amazing speed.

To accompany the rich pastete I made a light mushroom consommé with lemon. Mushrooms with lemon? you might wonder, but sour and mushroom do go quite well together. Just think of pickled or marinated mushrooms. The soup is not nearly as photogenic as the pie, but was tart and delicious. I didn't have wild mushrooms (again, the seasonal thing) so I just used brown mushrooms, otherwise known as chestnut mushrooms.

Unused ingredients: brie, pears (if pears were in season, I'd just serve a juicy fresh one with a wedge of ripe, runny brie as a cheese course / dessert).

Technorati Tags: masterchef, mushrooms, pastete, pie, soup, spinach

Mushroom-lemon soup

250g / about 8 oz fresh mushrooms, sliced thinly
Beef or vegetable stock cube, or canned or homemade stock
6 cups of water (if you're using stock cubes; use the same amount of liquid stock if you're using that)
Juice of 1 lemon
1 cup dry white wine
about 1 cup of the white part of leek, finely chopped (you can use onion instead)
3 garlic cloves, finely chopped
2 Tbs fresh parsley, finely chopped
1/2 tsp dried thyme
Butter
Salt and pepper

Sauté the leek and garlic in butter until limp and translucent. Add the mushrooms, and sauté until the volume reduces considerably and the mushrooms are quite brown.

Add the water with stock cube (I find beef works best, but vegetable is fine too) or canned or homemade stock. Bring up to a boil, then reduce the heat. Add the white wine, parsley and thyme, and simmer for 20+ minutes.

Add the lemon juice, and season to taste with salt and pepper. You can optionally swirl a spoonful of creme fraiche, sour cream or yogurt on top of each bowlful.

Chicken and spinach pie

1 readymade puff pastry sheet made with butter
300g / 10 oz. boneless chicken breast, sliced thinly
200ml / about 1/2 pint cream
1/2 cup dry white wine
about 1 cup of the white part of leek, finely chopped
1 Tbs fresh tarragon, finely chopped
300g / 10 oz (well, like 3 BIG handfuls) fresh spinach leaves, well washed and stems removed
Pinch nutmeg
Butter
Salt and pepper
1 egg

Note: remember to keep your pastry sheet in the refrigerator until you need to roll it out.

Preheat the oven to 180°C / 360°F. Line a baking sheet with a silicon non-stick sheet.

Sauté the chopped leek in butter until soft and transclucent. Add the wine and cream, bring up to a boil then simmer over low heat until it has thickened considerably. Add the tarragon, and season with salt and pepper.

While the sauce is cooking, heat up some more butter in a very large pan. Add the spinach; you may need to add it in stages. Stir about until the spinach has reduced to a little pile. (I always find it amazing how much the volume of spinach goes down when it's cooked.) Season with salt, pepper and a little freshly grated nutmeg. Drain into a colander or sieve. Set aside to cool a bit.

Add the chicken to the sauce, and turn off the heat. This is to prevent the chicken from overcooking - it cooks from the heat of the sauce, and it will also continue to cook in the oven.

Beat up the egg.

Open up the refrigerated pastry sheet on the lined baking sheet. Put the spinach down the middle of the sheet. Layer the chicken-sauce mix over the spinach. Carefully bring up the pastry sheet over the filling to cover, and crimp up the ends. Slash the top with a sharp knife, or poke all over with a fork. Paint the top with the beaten egg.

Bake in the oven for about 30 minutes, until the top is golden brown. Some of the sauce may leak, but don't worry about it.

To serve, cut into wedges. This is good piping hot or at room temperature.

Melange of mushrooms soup

maki — Wed, 14 Jan 2004 23:22:21 +0100

We are a little past the peak of the mushroom season now, but it's still quite possible to get a whole variety of fresh cultivated and wild mushrooms. And what better way to have them than in a simple soup, that really brings out their flavor?

For this soup, I would choose about one-half cultivated mushrooms, and one-half wild mushrooms, simply for the sake of cost - but of course if you can afford all wild mushrooms, by all means go all the way! It's also not too bad with all cultivated mushrooms either. Any kind of mushrooms that catch your eye would do; the only ones I would avoid are shimeji and shiitake. Shimeji are the white, rather tasteless stringy mushrooms often used in Japanese dishes; they are rather trendy, but to my mind only good for texture, not flavor. Shiitake I would also avoid because it has a very distinctive and rather overwheming flavor to me. If you love shiitake though, you could make an all-shiitake version too.

For this version, I used brown cultivated mushrooms, sometimes called chestnut mushrooms, plus wonderful yellow chantarelles, oyster mushrooms, and a couple of porcini. The aroma and flavor are absolutely wonderful. If you are on a strict low-fat diet, you can omit the cream and simply simmer it gently in the vegetable stock and it will still be quite good.

Once you've had this you'll never go back to canned Cream of Mushroom Soup again.

Mélange of mushrooms soup

200 g / about half a pound of fresh cultivated brown mushrooms (chestnut mushrooms) or white mushrooms
200g of mixed wild mushrooms; chantarelles, oyster mushrooms, porcini, etc.
1-2 garlic cloves
1 shallot, or 1 small onion
1 good quality vegetable stock cube (I use Knorr or Maggi)
Butter
Fresh or dried thyme, a couple of parsley sprigs, and bay leaf (the classic bouquet garni)
Salt and pepper
About 1 cup of cream

Brush off any dirt from the mushrooms with a moist paper towel. Thinly slice the cultivated mushrooms; sort of cut up the wild mushrooms (the chantarelles and oyster mushrooms you can almost tear apart with your hands). Chop the garlic and shallot or onion finely.

Heat about 1 Tbs. unsalted butter in a heavy-bottom pot. Add the garlic and shallots and saute until just limp. Add the cultivated mushrooms, and a bit more butter if you like, and saute until the mushrooms start to shrink. At first they will give out a lot of moisture, which will evaporate quickly then the mushrooms will turn brown and shrink. Add the wild mushrooms at this point (they are more tender than the cultivated ones) and briefly sauté them.

Add enough water to make the mushrooms float just a bit (that means, enough to cover, and a bit more to that). Add the stock cube. At this point, if you are a neat person tie up the parsley, thyme and bay leaf in a bit of cheesecloth and dangle it in the pot - or, if you're like me and are a messy cook, just add the thyme - dried of the leaves of a sprig of fresh, a bayleaf, and the parsley sprigs whole into the pot. You'll be fishing out the parsley and bay leaf later.

Let this simmer for about 10-15 minutes.

Add the cream, stirring. Salt and pepper to taste. Simmer just a bit more (about 5 minutes) until piping hot. Take out the bay leaf and parsley before serving.

Feeds 4 very hungry people with good bread for lunch, or makes a very nice starter for a winter meal.

Mushroom rice

maki — Sat, 29 Nov 2003 12:58:07 +0100

Fall is the season for wild mushrooms. We can get mushrooms all year round now of course, but the wild variety are at their best when the fungi can draw lots of nice nutrients from the rotting leaves and wood that is lying around.

Fungi are a strange thing. They feast on decay. All plant material draw energy to grow from their decayed ancestors, but fungi are the only things that draw all of their energy from this source. And, the more they can suck up, the more flavorful they seem to be.

Truffles for instance, are so greedy that they don't even raise their heads out of the earth, until their are sniffed out by pigs or dogs. (Allegedly, virgins can also detect truffles.) I was quite sceptical about the reputation enjoyed by the truffle, until the day I actually had one, a real one, not just truffle oil or the microscopic specks of truffle that are allegedly in some canned patés. This was a real truffle, sliced into bold chunks and baked inside a dish modestly called a galette de pommes (potato cake) on the menu of the Beurehiesel in Stransbourg. (The Buerehiesel is a 3-star Michelin establishment, and our favorite restaurant right now. It will be mentioned many times in this blog I'm sure.) The wonderful fragrance of the truffle permeated the potato cake and made it something out of this world.

While we can't afford truffles on a regular basis, we can enjoy wild mushrooms. One of our favorite ways of enjoying a delightfully smelly bag of mixed fungi is simply cooked in our trusty rice cooker with a basic dashi stock. It can be assembled in no time, and then you just wait for your kitchen to be filled with the fragrance of the 'shrooms. It's low-fat too.

[Update:] See this vegan variation of mushroom rice.

Recipe: Japanese-style Mushroom Rice (_kinoko takikomi gohan_)

3 cups (750ml) of Japanese style _japonica_ rice (often sold as sushi rice)
3 1/2 cups (875ml) of basic dashi stock
300g (about 10-12 oz) of mixed mushrooms, such as shiitake, chantarelles, oyster mushrooms. You can use regular button mushrooms but it won't be nearly as good.
Soy sauce
Sake, or sherry
Mirin (sweet rice wine) - optional: you can just use a little more sake and a touch of sugar instead
1 fried bean curd (aburaage) (optional)

Wash the rice well in several changes of water, until the water runs clear. Drain.

Slice the mushrooms, or simply shred them with your hands. Cut the fried bean curd into small pieces. Place in a bowl.

Sprinkle with 1-2 Tbs. of soy sauce, 1 Tbs of sake, and 1 Tbs of mirin. Let marinate for about an hour if possible, though you can skip this if you're in a hurry. If you do, massage the mushrooms a bit with your hands to make the marinade penetrate.

Place the rice in a rice cooker and add the dashi and mushroom mixture. Cook the rice. If you don't have a rice cookier, cook thus: place the rice mixture in a pot with a heavy bottom and tight fitting lid. Bring to a boil. Immediately lower the heat to the lowest possible setting, place the lid on top, and steam-cook for about 20 minutes. Switch off and let rest for at least an additional 10 minutes.

A non-vegetarian alternative is to add small bits of cut of chicken instead of the fried bean curd.

To make it more "western" to serve as a rice side-dish, add a bit of butter to the cooked rice.