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Italian Style Mushrooms





I like mushrooms but I find than champignons have very little taste. I guess that I grew up with wild mushrooms (and lots of porcini) so maybe I am a bit of a snob... still, champignons are easy to find and I tend to use them as a 'base', adding other dried mushrooms for extra flavour.

I had a handful of dried porcini and another of dried Chinese black mushrooms, and I soak them in water for 30 minutes. In the meantime I cleaned and chopped 400 g of champignons (I tend to discard the stalks of the champignons, not sure why, but I learned to do it ages ago in Italy and I keep doing it).




I heated some olive oil with a few cloves of garlic, then I added the champignons and some salt. I cooked the mushrooms until all their water was gone (abut 20 minutes) then I added the dried mushrooms and their soaking water. 



After 5 minutes I added the content of a can of finely chopped Italian tomatoes, and some more water from rinsing the can (another 400 ml).



I let the mushrooms simmer, covered, for about one hour (yes that long) until almost all the liquid was gone. It may seem like a long cooking time, but it is winter after all, and it is nice to have a pot simmering on the stove :-).



At the end I added some fresh Italian parsley chopped with a clove of garlic, (about one tbsp in all). I served it with crescentine (as one of the fillings, usually I always have one hot filling for them), but you can use these mushrooms with polenta, pasta, and even couscous, or as a side dish, and they are wonderful as pie filler and to make mushrooms lasagna. 



Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©


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Comments

  1. RoseSeptember 4, 2011 at 7:21 AM

    I've only eaten wild mushrooms once in my life, what a treat. I can see how it would spoil you for plain old button mushrooms. This dish looks delicious...so savory and full of flavor.

    ReplyDelete
  2. AlessandraSeptember 4, 2011 at 3:59 PM

    Thank you Rose, and mushrooms are so nutritious too! The perfect Vegan food.

    ReplyDelete

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