The Aspiring Luddite

	I carry no phone An aspiring Luddite In a wired world. Mastodon Verification Link	Jeff Berry is an early adopter of the Internet and the Web, a late adopter of Twitter, and declines to adopt Facebook. With the death of Google+, he migrated to the Fediverse. He admins a medievalist Mastodon instance. He hates cell-phones.

Mushrooms on Toast
23 May 2013

Today's topic is fungus. Delicious, delicious fungus. Often mushrooms are part and parcel of some larger dish. It's hard to imagine a boeuf bourguignon without mushrooms, or a steak and kidney pie. They go on top of salads, pizzas or, for those who like such things, burgers.

More rarely, though, do they take center stage, which is a pity, since they can do a pretty star turn if given the chance - stuffed mushrooms can be delightful. For that matter, simply taking a portobello and sautéing it in a little oil yields excellent results. But there are so many other things to do with mushrooms. Serve them on toast, for example.

Here are two variations on that theme. The first is quite simple with shitake mushrooms and cream, the second a bit more elaborate with cremini and bacon. Both are damn good. [Lots of pictures]

Shitakes with Cream

a 1/2 pound or so of shitake mushrooms
2 Tbs or so of butter
a few Tbs of heavy cream
a sprinkling of sea salt

Clean your shitakes. I use a sprayer and then set them to drain, but your mileage may vary. Remove the stems either by cutting them off or breaking them off. Melt the butter over medium to low heat and add the mushrooms, including the stems. Mind you don't crowd them too much. Now comes the hard part, let them cook for simply ages. By that I mean half-an-hour, maybe longer. Keep the heat not too high, and stir and toss them now and again, but let them cook for a long time. You want them to actually start browning up, which, being shitakes, they will do without disintegrating.

Once they've browned up nicely and are smelling good (and tasting good; I recommend checking the taste by noshing on the stems), add the heavy cream and slosh them all around together. Tilt the pan and let the shrooms stew in the cream for a minute or two until it thickens up into a sort of sauce. Spoon it over toast, sprinkle with sea salt, or your preferred finishing salt, and serve.

Cremini with Bacon

a 1/2 pound or so of cremini mushrooms
a splash of butter or oil
a few strips of bacon or as much as you like. Leaner is better here.

The process is nearly the same as above. Clean and then slice the shrooms. Set them in your lipid over the lowish heat and let them cook for ten or fifteen minutes. Meanwhile, cut your bacon into little bits.

Push the shrooms to the side of the pan and add the bacon in the middle. There's no particular reason to do this, it's just fun. Well, that's not completely true; I wanted to get the pork on the heat as effectively as possible, so after putting the bacon in the middle, I flattened it down and then put the mushrooms back on top. Let it cook like that for five minutes, then stir it all together and let it cook for another ten or fifteen minutes at least to make sure the bacon is done; it won't hurt to go a bit long on the cooking time.

Again, spoon onto toast and serve.

The Aspiring Luddite