FOOD ON THE FOOD

Shiitake Banh Mi

A few weeks ago, I found myself with a glut of shiitake mushrooms. A sudden spell of warm weather caused my five logs to flush all at once with these small, rather dry, cracked mushrooms. The next day called for rain, so I decided to keep them out a little longer to let them grow a bit more and rehydrate. When I woke up the next morning, the temperature had plummeted, there was snow on the ground, and I ended up with several pounds of huge, rather waterlogged, partially frozen mushrooms (insert frowny-faced emoticon here).

Frozen mushrooms aren't the best. The way mushrooms grow from tiny pinheads to full-grown specimens is basically by inflating with water. But if that water should freeze, it will expand and rupture the cell walls. The results are pretty slimy. I know because I cooked the frozen ones anyway. Not the best.

On the upside, some of the mushrooms didn't freeze and these banh mi-like sandwiches were a great way to enjoy them. A banh mi is a sandwich that evolved in Vietnam during the French colonial period. It's usually some kind of meat, like pate or pork belly, in a baguette with pickled vegetables, fresh herbs, and spicy chili sauce—a fusion of both cultures in one tasty package. For this vegetarian version, shiitake slices are sautéed in soy sauce and garlic, then added to a baguette slathered with Sriracha mayo, layered with quick-pickled cucumbers and radishes, and garnished with cilantro and mint. Fresh-tasting and satisfying, this was lunch all week.

The idea was inspired by a recipe in the vegan cookbook Isa Does It by Isa Chandra Moskowitz, except I unveganed it by adding the mayo back in. Vegans and non-vegans alike will want to check out this book: it's full of things that even I would eat, and the food photography and overall design is great. And if you have the same pet peeve I have about authors' faces on the cover (no offense to anyone's face—all I want to see is the food), you can remove the dust jacket and underneath it, printed directly on the cover, is a nice colorful alphabet soup with little pasta letters spelling out "Let's Eat."

Yes, let's!


Shiitake Banh Mi    

Avoid super-crusty baguettes for these sandwiches unless you want the roof of your mouth shredded. Aim for something mid-way between a soft sub roll and a traditional baguette (Russo's shoppers: try the medium sub rolls that come in bags of three on the bottom shelf). Also, I used regular red radishes, which turned the picking liquid pink and gave the vegetables a rosy hue by Day 2. If you want a more manly sandwich, maybe stick with the traditional white daikon radishes.

Quick Pickles
1/2 cup rice vinegar
1/2 cup water
1 tablespoon granulated sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup thinly sliced radishes
1 cup thinly sliced English or Persian cucumber

Shiitakes
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 pound shiitake mushrooms, caps sliced 1/4-inch thick, stems removed
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons soy sauce

Sriracha mayo
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1 teaspoon Sriracha
Salt to taste

Assembly
4 soft baguette rolls
Fresh cilantro sprigs
Fresh mint leaves

For the pickles, whisk together the vinegar, water, sugar, and salt until dissolved. Stir in the vegetables and let them sit in the liquid until ready to serve.

For the shiitakes, preheat a large sauté pan over medium-high heat. When hot, add the oil and then the shiitakes. Sauté until they soften, release their moisture, and brown a bit in spots, 5 to 10 minutes depending on how much moisture they contain. Add the garlic and sauté for 30 seconds before adding the soy sauce, stirring until well mixed and fragrant. Remove the mushrooms to a shallow bowl to cool slightly.

For the Sriracha mayo, whisk together the mayo, Sriracha, and salt. As written, the spice level is about medium, but you can adjust it to your liking by adding more mayo or more Sriracha.

To assemble the sandwiches, split the baguettes lengthwise by cutting out a narrow wedge from the top. Then hollow out the rolls a little by pulling out some of the extra bread inside to make room for more filling. Spread the inside generously with Sriracha mayo. Add some cooked mushrooms, then some pickled radish and cucumbers, and then cilantro and mint. Eat up. Any remaining sandwich components can be stored several days covered in the fridge. Makes 4 sandwiches.

Source: Adapted from Isa Does It by Isa Chandra Moskowitz.

Shiitake Haiku

Velvet parasol
Unfurled by autumn rain
Shiitake mushroom

How to Clean a Hen of the Woods Mushroom

This will probably be my last mushroom post until next spring, so you can all breathe a deep sigh of relief. But first I have to tell you what happened after last week's hen of the woods post. To refresh your memory, that was the post in which I was being a big baby because I was unable to successfully lay claim to my very own hen of the woods mushroom, despite having found four. (Sheesh, Tammy, ever heard of a store? Shut up, whose side are you on?)

Within the course of 24 hours, that post was forwarded by a kind reader to someone who had several suspected hens of the woods growing right in her yard. I was invited to make a house call to a neighboring town to scope out the fungal situation. This is not the first time I've gone on a mushroom-related house call. Earlier this year, I was led to a house that had literally dozens of black morels popping out of the mulch. Can you imagine that? A flower bed full of morels right out your own front door??? I was dumbstruck! I had to be slapped across the face several times before I snapped out of it.

This time, I was much more composed. Once I located the house in question, I spotted the hens roosting at the base of an oak tree—all four of them. I drove by verrrrry sloooowly with the windows down, ogling them like Lenny and Squiggy, until I crashed into some trash cans! Okay, so there weren't any trash cans, but it's my story. I'll tell it how I want. I ran out of the car, ignoring the trash cans everywhere, and ran through my hen of the woods identification check list:

Location at base of oak tree: check.

Brown, ruffly structure: check.

Pores not gills: check.

Smells right: check.

Nooooo maggots: well, just a few. It's a ground-dwelling fungus, after all. One can't expect too much.

Not only was the identity of the mushroom confirmed , but I also had permission to take some mushrooms home (hooray!!!). That was the crucial missing link. So I did—specifically, two hens growing next to each other that had become conjoined into one 4-pound mass. I didn't just rip them out of the ground; I cut them at their bases to leave the underground mycelium intact. This helps encourage future mushrooms to grow in the same area in subsequent seasons. Remember, there are no poisonous look-alikes for this mushroom (also known as maitake and grifola frondosa). That combined with its tastiness makes it a mushroom everyone should know. Many thanks to M and H for getting it into my greedy little hands!

Tell me this isn't a pretty mushroom!

But, wow, I forgot what a pain in the ass they are to clean. I brushed off as much debris as possible initially, but there are so many crevices, you could easily spend an hour or more properly preparing this mushroom for eating. Plus you have to escort out all the creepy-crawlies that were using it as a luxury condo. Worms. Spiders. CENTIPEDES!!! Boy, for someone who likes to hang around rotting stumps, I sure am afraid of centipedes. (It's their speed that gets me. Their deadly speed!)

So in case you ever find yourself in possession of a hen of the woods, here are some tips for prepping this delicacy:

• Set mushroom in a large bowl and pick off all the acorns, leaves, and twigs.

• Brush off dirt with an unused paintbrush or other kitchen-grade brush using lots of quick, brisk strokes, working from top to bottom.

• Using a sharp paring knife, cut off the dirtiest parts of the base, and move mushroom to a clean cutting board.

• Wipe off the knife and cut through the remaining base into workable sections as if you're cutting up a cauliflower through its core.

• Cut off rotten, bruised, or moldy sections, and discard. Escort worms and bugs out of the crevices with tip of knife.

• Cut into smaller pieces, 1-3 inches wide depending on your purpose. Make a point to cut into any areas with lots of crevices to evict any lurking insects. (I find the central part of the mushroom to be plenty tender in young specimens, though it may be too tough in older ones.)

• Wipe off any remaining dirt on each piece with damp paper towels. You will go through quite a few of them. (I don't soak mushrooms in water. I find that makes them slimy, waterlogged, and hardly any cleaner.)

• What you end up with is something like little mushroom florets—two big plates of them from a four-pound mushroom. Cover with damp paper towels and plastic wrap with some holes poked in it.

• It's best to cook them right away, but they will last in the fridge for several days this way (the paper towels will need remoistening).

• Always cook the mushrooms well. One way is to sauté them in butter for 15-20 minutes until tender. If the pieces start to brown before they're tender, add some water and keep cooking.

• Inevitably, a little bit of grit ends up in your dish despite your best efforts. Just add extra black pepper. Any little worms you missed will be easily identified by their coiled-up forms at the bottom of the pan. Discard them immediately and think nothing more about what you just saw. Instead, think of all the invisible cancer-fighting compounds this mushroom contains. Yum!

Since it's such a big deal to me to find these, I like to make something really special. I layer the cooked mushrooms with lasagna noodles, browned sweet Italian sausage, lots and lots of braised celery root and leeks, mozzarella and parmesan cheese, and a creamy sauce. I bake two trays and freeze one away. It's totally worth the work.

Wild Morels: How to Find Your Own

Wow, that is one phallic-looking mushroom!  But let's not get distracted.  I promised you hints for finding morels and hints you shall receive, at least for the yellow morel (Morchella esculenta).  Please note that these are only suggestions based on my own limited, amateur experience and, let's face it, a healthy dose of beginner's luck.  Still, they're better than nothing. 

Hint #1: THEY'RE OUT RIGHT NOW!!!  Late April through early June. 

Hint #2: You'll probably want to read some books before you go.  The field guide I have is the National Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Mushrooms.  This is the book I bring to the woods.  Another book I love is The Complete Mushroom Book by Antonio Carluccio, an Italian chef and forager.  It has great recipes and amazing photos.  Total mushroom porn.  This is the book that moves between the kitchen and the bedside table.  But the book that really made the idea of foraging for my own wild mushrooms accessible to a novice was Start Mushrooming, which was recommended by a Harvard-trained mycologist friend.  It teaches you how to identify six edible varieties of wild mushrooms safely.  Morels are one of them. 

Hint #3:  As far as habitat, I found my first two morels under a blossoming apple tree.  Old farms and apple orchards are prime hunting grounds.  Be sure to ask permission before foraging on private property.

Later, I found a bunch in the woods under what looked like a dead oak tree. 

Morels love dead elms and stressed-out ash trees, too, I hear.  Watch out for poison ivy.  Since morels are associated with the roots of certain trees, you'll often find more than one around the base of the trunk, sometimes as far as 10 feet out.  Mine were much closer. 

Morels seem to grow all over Massachusetts, but my luck turned when I headed away from the city a bit, say 30 minutes due west of Boston.  If you want ideas for trails, check out the Bay Circuit Greenway maps.

Look at this morel growing through a maple leaf.  Weird.

 

I also found a bunch of poisonous false morels on my trek, like the one below:

I didn't touch them.  They are the poisonous look-alikes that the experts warn you about.  I don't think this one really looks like a morel, though, do you?  I mean, something would have to be seriously wrong with that morel for it to be a morel.  Like if it were growing out of a toxic waste dump or something.  But false morels can look a lot more like true morels, as in this photo.  Can you tell the difference?   Real morels have more of a conical shape and a pitted, honeycomb appearance.  False morels tend to be wrinkled (as if deflated), misshapen, and brain-like in shape.  Another difference: real morels are completely hollow inside while false morels are chambered and often filled with a whitish, cottony material.  Cut your morels in half, top to bottom, to double check your answers. 

Finally, we come to the disclaimer portion of this post.  Here it is: Don't be an idiot.  Don't eat anything you're not 100% sure about.  Always cook morels thoroughly—never eat them raw as they contain a toxin that is deactivated with cooking.  Furthermore, some people have allergic reactions to certain mushrooms that are edible to the majority.  I am one such person.  So, if you've never had morels before, or any other wild mushroom, it's a good idea to start with a few bites and then wait 24 hours to see how things go digestively before you gorge yourself. 

Good luck on your morel hunt!  It's such a thrill to find them!

Mother's Day Morels

Guess who found morels on Mother's Day?  ME!  It was ME!!!  Seven of them!!!  Can you believe it??

Actually, I found more, but it's proper mushroom etiquette to leave some behind.  It was hard, but I did comply.  Barely.  Your next question, I'm going to guess, is where exactly I found these morels (especially if you arrived here by Googling "morels Massachusetts" or "morels Boston").  But I'm not telling you where I found them, so don't ask.  If you do ask, I'll be happy to draw you a perplexing map—one you will be unlikely to decipher since my sense of direction is terrible and I can't draw for shit.  However, if you do manage to figure it out, the trail will magically lead you to the morel bin at Russo's because why not just buy them from the store if you're going to have someone tell you exactly where to look.  That's missing the whole point: the thrill of the hunt!  You have to find your own spots.  I've clocked nearly a dozen hours in the woods over the last week and a half to find these and I've loved every second of it.  Except for the part where the mosquitos were biting me.  I didn't love that part.  But the rest was awesome and you'll love it, too.  (Just bring bug spray.)

Here I am cutting my very first morel with the pocketknife Husband gave me for Mother's Day.  I literally could not believe my eyes when I first spotted it.  I froze for a second, then began frantically fumbling around for my camera as if it would disappear at any moment.  Then I saw another one about a foot away.  The rest I found in another location.  Thank god nobody else was around to hear me giggling and talking to myself as I collected them.  I mean, except for the jogger who came charging up behind me out of nowhere.  (Dude, the next time you run up behind a woman like that in a completely isolated area, you might want to announce loudly and clearly that you're not a rapist or you're likely to get a pocketknife to the heart.)

When I brought the mushrooms home, the children were very excited and unanimously declared them to be "yellow morels, not black morels."  (They keep stealing all of my mushroom books.)  Husband insisted that I get a second opinion about the edibility of these mushrooms before I cooked them—a second opinion besides the children's.  I thought I might as well set a good example for you guys for a change, right?  So I grudgingly returned the stick of butter in my hand to the refrigerator and proceeded to contact Russ Cohen, local wild edibles guru.  He confirmed that they were, indeed, yellow morels.  Huzzah!  I'll let you imagine the seven-bite feeding frenzy that followed!

In my next post, I'll share some tips for finding your own morels as well as my favorite mushroom books.  And, yes, I'll get that post up this week, keep your pants on. 

Cookbook Friday: Stuffed Mushrooms

Let’s talk about mushrooms!

I have a love/hate relationship with mushrooms.  I love to eat them, but sometimes they make me vomit.  Same with wine (why, God, why?) and, in an unexpected twist this week, sometimes summer squash.  But, like I said, I LOVE mushrooms and will choose to eat them based on how convenient it might be at that moment to vomit spontaneously.

What’s that you say?  It’s never convenient to vomit?  Well, you would be right, sir, but have you ever tasted mushrooms?  They’re delicious.  This is the dilemma of my life.

On the other hand, my dad, Freddie Donroe, has a hate/hate relationship with mushrooms.  Unlike all of the other things my dad claims to hate when he really just doesn’t realize he likes them, my dad really does hate mushrooms.  Here’s why.

When my dad was much, much younger, his father, Albert Donroe (my Poppi), used to take him to forage for mushrooms.  I assume, since Poppi’s family was from Naples, that this was in his blood, or, at the very least, he had some tutelage.  Poppi had a special place they always went, some woods near a quarry in Hamden, Connecticut (maybe East Rock, maybe Sleeping Giant).  There, according to my dad, Poppi would go over every rotting stump he could find and gather mushrooms of every shape and size.  To hear my dad tell the story, Poppi never turned one down, food poisoning be damned. 

After about 45 minutes, and what I can only imagine was my dad’s constant whining, they returned home so Poppi could cook them.  And this is where things got really ugly.  Sometimes, he cooked them in a sauce for spaghetti, but usually they were just sautéed.  The smell was so bad, my dad remembers, he’d completely lose his appetite.  I believe “hellacious” was the word he used to describe it.  Nobody else in the house would touch the stuff, so Poppi just cooked them for himself.  Meanwhile, my dad would make himself scarce for as long as the smell lingered.  To this day, he can’t stomach them.

Now, the question I have is, was Poppi really that bad of a cook?  Perhaps, not a very discriminating hunter/gatherer?  Or were they, in fact, delicious, but my dad just hates mushrooms?  Anyone else ever taste them?  Because I’m willing to bet I would have been smacking my lips, even as they were wheeling me to the ER.  (Poppi, by the way, is a whopping 93.)

The following recipe is Nonni’s Marchigiano recipe for stuffed mushrooms.  They have never made me vomit. 

 

Stuffed Mushrooms

The secret to these is long, slow cooking in a cool oven.  Don’t rush them.

10 oz. package button mushrooms
3 Tbsp. olive oil
1 Tbsp. garlic, minced
¼ cup fresh bread crumbs
½ cup grated Parmesan cheese
Salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 300°F.  To the bottom of an 8”x8” pan, add 1 Tbsp. of the oil. 

Using a damp towel, wipe dirt off of mushrooms.  Gently, pull out the stems and chop them finely.  In a medium bowl, combine chopped stems with garlic, bread crumbs, cheese, salt, and pepper.  Working over the bowl, mound stuffing into hollowed out mushrooms.  Set in oiled pan.  Drizzle with remaining 2 Tbsp. of oil.  Bake uncovered for 1 hour or longer (Nonni cooks the hell out of them and that’s how I like them). 

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
Hamden, Connecticut
1918 -

 

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