Stuffed Mushrooms

This past Sunday brought upon us a football game, and as we might recall from any of my previous fall posts, Sunday football brings about good food, whether it be an appetizer or a comfort dish. As we were heading back from a trip to the mall, the obvious question was, ‘What should we have for the game?’. My wife instantly said chili. Chili it was, but I had something else on my mind, as the day before I had purchased a few things at the store, stuffed mushrooms.

On average, I make stuffed mushrooms four times a year, typically when friends or family come over, because they are not only easy to make, but they make a nice and hearty appetizer. For this batch of stuffed mushrooms, I used portabella mushrooms, and pork, however you will note below that I stuff them differently throughout the year.

Ingredients:

• 3 large portabella muchrooms, stemmed and cleaned of dirt
• 1 cup of pork, uncooked and seasoned (see below)
• 2 green onions, finely chopped
• Salt to season
• Pepper to season
• 2 tbsp sherry cooking wine
• Parmesan cheese

Combine your pork with the green onions, sherry, parmesan cheese, and salt and pepper and let it marinate for one hour or longer. In the meantime, clean your mushrooms and set aside. In order to clean the mushroom, I typically lightly dampen a piece of paper towel and gently remove the dirt. You do not want to put them in, or under water.

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees. Once your meat is done marinating, liberally stuff each mushroom with the pork. Place on a baking tray and cook for roughly 15-20 minutes until the pork is cooked through. Sprinkle with some parmesan cheese, and serve warm.

Other stuffing alternatives that I have had success with is warmed cream cheese on the stove top, with chopped garlic and parmesan cheese; this one is really rich, so be careful. Another great one to play with is a heated portabella mushroom and with a dollop of the blue cheese dressing.