I admit, it is a little cliche, but the New Year has brought about a good excuse for me to become more motivated to eat well and exercise.  Truthfully, I am feeling quite positive about my new lifestyle, except for one thing:  I know I need to cut back on my over-consumption of pasta.  Pasta is my achilles heel.  I love it.  Not only is it the first thing that usually comes to mind when I am thinking about what to cook, it is usually what I crave whenever I am seeking any sort of culinary comfort.  For these reasons, I eat a lot of pasta.

As part of my resolution, I am seeking ways to get the same comfort and satisfaction I get from pasta without actually using any pasta, and this was the first dish that really hit the mark.   Preparing it was as easy as throwing together pasta dish, and eating it felt deliciously familiar and comfortable.  The other bonus to this dish is that the mushrooms could be stuffed with many different ingredients.

Allow one large portabello for each person you are feeding.  I served the dish with a light salad, and I was stuffed – no pun intended.

Ingredients:

• 4 large portabella mushrooms, with stems, brushed clean
• 5 pieces of Canadian bacon, chopped into 1/2 inch peices
• 1 large yellow onion, chopped
• 1 small red or greed chili, finely diced
• 5 cloves of garlic, minced
• 3 tablespoons of bread crumbs
• 1/2 cup of crumbled feta cheese
• 1/2 cup of mozzarella cheese, shredded
• 1 can or jar of tomato sauce
• Salt
• Olive oil

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.  Brush the mushrooms clean with a most towel.  Remove the stem, chop into 1/4 inch dice and reserve.  In a shallow baking dish, season the mushrooms with salt and pepper and sprinkle with a tablespoon of olive oil each.  With the underside of the mushroom cap facing up, place in the oven to begin roasting.

Heat a large skillet over medium high heat.  Add two tablespoons of olive oil.  When the oil is hot, add the Canadian bacon.  Once the Canadian bacon is beginning to brown, add the onion, peppers, and garlic and salt to taste.  Cook until the vegtables begin to soften.  Add the mushroom stems.  Continue to saute until the vegtables are soft, about 7 mimutes. Turn off the heat and add the breadcrums and the feta cheese.  Toss throughly until mixture is combined.

Remove the mushroom caps from the oven.  Carefully remove the caps from the dish and pour in the tomato sauce.  Return the mushroom caps so that Top the caps with the stuffing mixture.  Cover with mozarella cheese and return to the oven.  Bake the mushrooms at 375 for twenty minutes.  Turn the heat up to 475 for the last few minutes just to brown the cheese.

Serve one stuffed mushroom to each person and cover with the tomato sauce on the bottom of the baking dish.  Serve immediately.

Few things in the culinary kingdom are better than mushrooms in my mind – especially when you slow cook them over low heat to get all of their moisture out and concentrate their flavor.  Comforting to no end – especially when paired with a good salad and some bread to soak it all up.

Trust me, this soup is not your traditional out-of-the-can variety cream of mushroom.  It is also not over the top creamy, which I like.  It’s focus is on the mushroom flavor, as it should be in my opinion.  This recipe is one that I owe to Elise over at Simply Recipes – I’ve adapted it a little, but the base is from her site (which I discovered actually appears to be a Wolfgang Puck recipe).  When I was initially searching for a mushroom soup recipe, I decided to try hers because of her inclusion of lemon juice – which I though would pair very well with the flavor of the mushrooms and add something extra that other recipes lacked.  It worked too – you couldn’t really taste the acid of the lemon per se, but there was certainly something there that was bringing the whole soup to life.

I decided to use Crimini mushrooms in this soup, but the better the mushrooms you can gather, the better your soup!  If you can afford it, shitakes, chanterelles or ever porcinis would only enhance this soups flavor – but I was cooking on somewhat of a budget being holiday time, so I decided to go with a more affordable mushroom.

To make this recipe you will need either a food processor or a blender, and both will work (see my instructions below).  A great accompaniment to this soup (a topper) would be garlic croutons from Aimee’s Caeser Salad recipe, and some parsley. Enjoy!

• 1 lb. Mushrooms – A combination of Criminis, Shitakes, Portobellos, Chanterelles, Porcinis (I used all criminis (baby portobello), which is totally fine)
• 3 medium sized shallots – minced or grated
• 1 clove garlic – finely minced or crushed into a paste
• 5-6 thyme sprigs – leaves removed and chopped
• 2 bay leaves
• Juice of 1 lemon
• 1/2 tsp. lemon zest
• 2-3 c. chicken stock (homemade preferable) – amount depends on the consistency you like your soup to be – for a thicker soup, use less stock
• 1 1/2 – 2 c. Cream (half and half or heavy cream or both)
• 2 Tbsp. unsalted butter
• Salt and pepper
• chopped parsley for garnish (optional)

Start out by prepping the mushrooms:

• Criminis (baby bellas): clean any dirt off the mushrooms (try not to run them under water though!!!) and trim the ends of the stems off, then quarter them.
• Shitakes: remove the stems and quarter the caps.
• Porcinis: clean off any dirt and quarter them, stem and all.
• Chanterelles: cut them lengthwise into quarters.
• Portobellos: stems should already be removed – cut the caps into 1/2 inch strips and then half the strips.

**Food processor method**: Once you have your mushrooms prepped: load them up into you food processor with the juice of half of the lemon and chop until they are the consistency of a fine dice. (see the ‘no food processor method’ below)

Meanwhile, in a heavy bottomed pot, melt the butter over medium heat, add in the shallots and cook for 4-5 minutes until translucent.  Add in the garlic, thyme, bay leaves and mushrooms and continue to cook over medium-low heat.  Salt the ingredients at this point to help the moisture release.  As the mushrooms begin to cook, you’ll see that they release some moisture.  This is a good thing – continue to cook them until you can see that all of this moisture has cooked off – may take 10-15 minutes.  Make sure the heat is low enough so they don’t brown too much.

Once the moisture is gone – add in the stock, cream, lemon zest, black pepper and a little more salt.  Bring the liquid to a boil and reduce the heat to a simmer and let this cook for around 15-20 minutes.  Add in the rest of the lemon juice and stir to combine.  Taste the soup at this point and adjust the salt levels as needed for your tastes.  If the soup is too thin at this point, continue to cook – if it is too thick, add a little more stock.

If you desire a less chunky soup, you can run the soup through a blender at this point, but I would not recommend using a sieve to strain this soup.  If you are fine with the consistency, serve it as is!  Top with some croutons and chopped parsley – and if you really want to take it over the top, finish it with some truffle oil.

**No food processor method**: Cook the prepped mushrooms in the pan as you would with the chopped mushrooms, but you will need to cook them for a little longer to render out the moisture.  You will also want to use a blender to puree the soup after it is done cooking, then bring back to the heat and cook down or thin as necessary.

Serves 4-5

Don’t let me fool you, this recipe is rather rich and rather French.  If you’ve never poached fish, go ahead and try it with a fish with a fairly high fat content like Salmon, Sea Bass or Sardines even.  It’s tougher to overcook and will stand up better to this cooking process.

Salmon is always a tough protein for me to judge.  I think everyone can relate to walking into the supermarket or fish monger and seeing the typical two types of salmon staring you in the face.  You have the more commonly found farmed salmon, which as we know allegedly get ‘dyed’ with pink dye to look like the real thing.  Then there’s the wild stuff, which usually doesn’t look as good as the farmed to the naked eye.  The wild stuff is usually about double the price too, so how is someone supposed to decide?

Well I usually go with the wild salmon, as I think it just tastes better, but I will buy farmed too – it’s still delicious if you can get past the whole dye thing.  A note about wild salmon is that in many cases, it doesn’t need to be cooked as long.  We got some wild Sockeye salmon for this recipe and it literally was done in 5 minutes.  You don’t want to overcook salmon, and while it can be hard to do this when poaching, a nice medium rare is really what you’re looking for.

Chanterelles on the other hand are such a treat when they are around.  You can usually find them dried year round, but are only fresh on the shelf for a short period (right around Oct-Dec they’re exquisite!).  Chanterelles are wild mushrooms harvested from the forest floor and usually grow very well in the pacific northwest.  Their flavor is very potent, almost resembling truffles – just taking a good sniff of a ripe Chanterelle will let you know that this is a rich ingredient.  If you do happen upon some, make sure they’re in really good shape before you buy them, they’re not worth the money otherwise (usually around $25/pound…no joke).

I decided to poach some salmon and make a little Chanterelle pan sauce and serve it over the salmon.  This is also one of those meals that is fairly simple and easy to make, but it will make you look like you’ve been slaving away for hours.

• Fillet of salmon – .4-.5 Lb per person (this recipe serves 4 people – so 1.75 fillet is perfect) – cut into steaks.
• 1 lb. Chanterelle Mushrooms (use less if you want) – chopped lengthwise and leave them fairly big!  you want the pieces to be big enough to chew!
• 1 1/2 c. Fish/seafood stock
• 1/2 c. white wine – a decent chardonnay or sauvignon blanc
• 1 medium yellow onion – julienned or sliced into half moon shapes
• 2 cloves garlic – roughly chopped
• 7-8 sprigs of Thyme – leaves left on
• 1 Tbsp. Dijon Mustard
• 1/2 Cream (1/2 and 1/2 works fine too)
• 2-3 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice
• 3 Tbsp. unsalted butter
• Salt and pepper to taste

Start by heating your butter in a medium-sized pan over medium heat.  Add in the Chanterelles and cook, browning the mushrooms a little bit but be sure not to burn them or overcook!  Some juices from the mushrooms will be released, just leave that in the pan.  Remove the mushrooms from the pan, leaving the juices behind and set them aside.

Lower the heat a little bit and add the onion garlic and thyme sprigs to the pan and cook quickly.  You don’t want them to get any color whatsoever.  Add in the stock and wine next and use a utensil to pick up any mushroom bits that get stuck to the bottom of the pan.  Add in the salmon (there should be enough liquid to cover the fish) and cover the pan.  Monitor the Salmon though, it will cook pretty fast.  You want it to be medium rare as I mentioned before, to if necessary, use a fork to check its doneness.  When it’s finished cooking, remove it from the pan, leaving the poaching liquid.

Turn the heat up to medium-high and let the liquid cook off and reduce by half to 3/4.  You then want to strain the liquid through a sieve into a separate bowl (don’t let this go down the drain!!!).  Bring the heat down to low and add the liquid back to the pan.  Add in the Dijon mustard, cream lemon juice and salt and pepper to the mixture and bring to a gentle boil.  You want this to cook for a little while and thicken into more of sauce like consistency.  Add 1/2 of the Chanterelles back into the sauce.

To serve, ladle a puddle of the sauce onto the middle of a plate and place the salmon in the middle on top of the sauce.  Put some chanterelles on top of the fish and a little sauce on top of them and serve!

Serves 4

Here are some more insane looking Chanterelles recipes!

- Herbivoracious: Bruchetta with Chanterelles and Brie
- CD Kitchen: Bucatini With Chanterelles, Spring Peas & Prosciutto
- RecipeZaar: Mashed Potatoes with Chanterelles and Truffle Oil

Granted, meatloaf is hardly a gourmet concept to start with, and certainly Rachael Ray will not be the one to take it to that next level. Nevertheless, meatloaf is a comfort food standby for many people, my husband included. Every Christmas Eve, when RJ’s mom whips up a stylish Lobster Newburg for the family, she also makes a meatloaf for her two sons. Her version (RJ’s favorite) involves dry mustard, celery salt, and Worcestershire for flavoring, as well as a topping of barbecue sauce and bacon. It is very yummy and definitely satisfies the requirements of comfort food.

My mini meatloaves, however, are finished in far less time (haha – hence the “30 Minute Meals” origin), and I have jazzed them up a bit – a riff on Rachael Ray’s version, which you can find here (if you must – but don’t trust the disgusting picture – I promise they’re good!) .

Mini Meatloaves with Blue Cheese and Mushroom Gravy, adapted from Rachael Ray

Meatloaves:

1 ½ lbs. ground meatloaf mix (beef, veal, and pork – if your grocery doesn’t sell this or the makings of this, just use ground beef chuck)

1 large egg, beaten

¼ c. milk

½ c. bread crumbs (I used the Italian-flavored ones, but whatever you have is fine – use a bit more if you are using panko)

½ c. grated Parmigiano-Reggiano or Pecorino Romano

4 to 6 big leaves of fresh sage, thinly sliced

Black pepper

2 Tbs. extra-virgin olive oil

4 thin slices prosciutto di Parma, pancetta or bacon

Sauce:

8 or so cremini (baby portobello) mushrooms, sliced

1 clove garlic, crushed

1 Tbs. butter

1 Tbs. all-purpose flour

1 c. whole milk (plus more if needed)

pinch freshly grated nutmeg

Scant ¼ c. crumbled Gorgonzola (or more, by preference)

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees. In a large mixing bowl, combine the ground meat, beaten egg, milk, breadcrumbs, cheese, sage and pepper to taste. Try not to over mix, as this makes the loaves really dense and not as good. Form the mixture into four equally-sized loaves (like ovoid hamburgers) about 1 ½ inches thick.

Preheat a non-stick skillet over medium heat and add the oil. Cook the loaves in the skillet just long enough to brown the outside – 2 to 3 minutes per side. Place them on an oiled or parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Top the loaves with prosciutto (or pancetta or bacon) to cover in one layer. Bake for about 8 minutes.

While you’re waiting for the meatloaves to finish cooking, make the sauce. In the same skillet used to brown the meatloaves, add the mushrooms and the garlic (and a bit more olive oil if the pan is dry) and sauté over medium heat.

When mushrooms are browned to your liking (about 5 minutes for me), add a tablespoon of butter to the pan to melt. Once melted, add the tablespoon of flour and stir to combine. Let cook one minute, then add milk to the pan slowly, stirring constantly. Keep adding milk until you reach the desired consistency for gravy, or even a slight bit thinner. Add in the pinch of nutmeg and the blue cheese, stir to combine.

Serve the meatloaves topped with the gravy. The gravy is also great on top of mashed potatoes, baked potatoes or plain rice.

Ragu or Ragout has long standing tradition in both Italian and French cuisine – though the term actually means different things in each culture.  Italians have their regional Ragus; which for the most part imply a sauce including meats.  Different yet similar varieties hail from the north and Bologna (Ragu Bolognese) and from the south and Naples (Ragu Neopolitan).  Both usually include some combination of Mirepoix or Soffritto in Italian alongside pork and beef for meats.  The regions differ in the amount of tomato used and the way they cut their meat, but that’s a story for another day.

The French also use the term ‘Ragout‘, from the verb ragoûter, meaning ‘to revive the taste‘.  Their take on ragout however does not necessarily include meat and is a much more generalized term to describe a sauce or stew.

So on Monday, I came home from work with an abundance of awesome looking mushrooms picked up at our local farmer’s market.  My girlfriend Aimee and I decided to set out to make an ‘almost vegetarian’ variety of the popular ‘Ragu’ sauce – Mushroom Ragout with Swiss Chard.  We do want to credit this recipe to the amazing Alice Waters, whose book “The Art of Simple Food” has been picked over by me of late.  This is essentially her recipe with a few changes.

This version of Ragu is hearty but with subtle flavors.  There’s no kick of heat from chilies or overwhelming garlic flavor.  Perhaps it’s greatest asset is the heavy flavor of mushrooms, whose flavor are subtle and delicate by themselves.  As I mentioned, the sauce how we prepared it is ‘almost’ vegetarian – only supplemented with some Panceta cooked alongside the Swiss Chard.  The heartiness of the different types of mushrooms and other vegetables definitely make up for any lack of meat.

We were actually thinking about adding some protein and the first thing that came to mind was some Scallops, as we thought the subtleness of their flavor would go well with the rest of the ingredients.  Add scollops or shrimp if you want – cook them seperately and them add them in the end with the swiss chard (chicken would also be good).

Here’s what we did:

Ingredients:

• 2 Carrots – Peeled and cut into small cubes
• 2-3 stalks Celery – cut into small cubes
• 1 medium Onion – Diced
• 2 cloves Garlic – Fine dice
• 2 Tomatoes – Diced (or 1 small can of diced tomatoes – drained)
• 2 total pounds Mushrooms in 3 varieties (10 or so of each variety) – I used Shitake (10 – stems removed), Trumpet (5-6 these are huge – halved) and Mitake (2 medium clusters – rough chop)
• 4-5 thin slices Pancetta – chopped
• 1 small bunch (15-20 leaves) Swiss Chard – Stems removed and roughly chopped
• Leaves from about 10 Thyme sprigs
• 1 Bay Leaf

• 1/4 cup Parsley – Diced
• 1 1/2 cups Chicken Stock (Homeade preferred!)
• 3/4 cup Light Cream
• 4 Tbsp. Butter
• 4-5 Tbsp. Olive Oil
• Salt to taste

Method:

Please note that this should be done in two separate pans at the same time!!!

Start by starting a pot of boiling water for the pasta if wanted.  This sauce would also be delicious over a steak, but half or quarter the recipe if doing so.

PAN 1:  In a heavy bottomed pan, heat half of the butter and oil over medium heat.  Start the Mirepoix (carrots, onion and celery) and cook until the vegetables become soft but do not brown! (Adjust the heat as necessary).

About 10 minutes.  Add in the Thyme, Parsley and Bay Leaf.  Lower the heat to low and cook for another 5-10 minutes.  Add in the tomatoes and continue to cook for another 5 minutes.

PAN 2:  In a “stick” pan, heat the rest of the butter and oil (add more as needed) and add a third of the mushrooms by variety (cook each variety seperately), browning each and removing them before adding in the next.  You should cook them basically whole or halfed.  Once all of the mushrooms are cooked, let them rest for 1-2 minutes and then chop them to the size of the rest of the vegetables.

Once the mushrooms are done, add just a touch more oil to the pan and immediately add the Pancetta and cook for a minute or two and then add the Swiss Chard.  Let the chard wilt for a few minutes and then remove from the heat.

Combining: Add the mushrooms, chard and pancetta back into the pan with the Mirepoix and combine.  Add in the stock and cream and cook, covered, for about 15 minutes, adding more stock and cream if the liquid gets too thick or cooks off.

Serve with whole wheat linguine or the pasta of your choice. Enjoy!

Makes a big batch – 6 or so pasta servings.  8 if using with meat.