Cook with Mother-In-Law, Score Major Points

By: Matt Frazier

Holy cow this is a late post!  I’ve been running around like a madman today getting stuff in order before we leave for Hilton Head tomorrow, yet somehow I still haven’t even packed.  I’m finally getting to blogging, but seeing as I still have an s-load of stuff to do tonight, this post will have to be a short one. But nobody can say I didn’t write a post today!

By the way, the new 30-Day Challenges are rolling in.  The glorious wheels of change are in motion (get it?  rolling, wheels…)  It doesn’t start officially until Monday, so there’s still time to sign up!

Since we’re all leaving from here tomorrow, Erin’s mom, Anne Marie, has been staying with us the past two nights.  So last night she and I teamed up to make a nice meal, something we tend to do when we get together.  And since there were two cooks, we made two meals and put them together!

Wilted Arugula Salad with Potatoes and Feta

The base of our meal was this salad from Fine Cooking.  Unfortunately the recipe isn’t available online, but you can sign up for a free trial, get the recipe, and then cancel if you’re so inclined (I do this kind of stuff all the time!).  The salad was really interesting because of the sauteed pototoes and onions.  It would have been great on its own, but not great enough for us!  So to it, we added…

Goat Cheese and Rosemary Stuffed Portobello Mushrooms

For the “main course” to serve on top of our salad, Anne Marie and I made stuffed portobello mushrooms.  The recipe included some roasted chicken, but of course we nixed that.  There were so many other ingredients in there, though, that we really saw no need to substitute anything back in.  These were tasty, but for my money they were way too goat-cheesy.  So in the recipe I’m giving you, I’m cutting back on the cheese and adding some extra bread crumbs.

We were all very satisfied with this meal.  An informal vote yielded a rating of four to four-and-a-half cows out of five!  And that’s saying something, considering that when Anne Marie found out we were going vegetarian, she said something to the extent of “Am I going to have to stay in a hotel when I visit now?”

As I said, I didn’t love the glut of cheese in the stuffing, and truthfully, with the rich portobellos there was no need to make such a hearty salad.  And I suppose a food snob would tell me that mixing feta and goat cheese is weird.  But as far as I’m concerned, those are minor issues.  I’d highly recommended each of these meals, together or separate.

And if you’ve never tried it, I’d highly recommend cooking with your mother-in-law. 😉

Vegetarian Stuffed Portobello Mushroom Recipe

Ingredients (for four caps, but I like to eat two myself!):

• 4 large portobello mushrooms, gills removed with a spoon and discarded
• 4 small portobello stems, removed from the caps and chopped
• 2 Tbsp canola oil
• 1 shallot, minced
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1 tsp fresh rosemary, minced
• 1/4 cup white wine
• 3 ounces goat cheese
• 1/4 cup raisins or Craisins, minced
• 1 and 1/4 cups seasoned whole wheat bread crumbs
• 1/2 cup skim milk

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.  Heat a pan over medium high heat with the oil.  Add the shallot, chopped mushrooms stems, rosemary, and garlic.  Cook for 2-3 minutes, stirring frequently, until garlic is lightly brown.  Add the wine and scrape up any browned bits.  Let it reduce for a minute or so, then add the goat cheese, raisins, breadcrumbs, and milk.  Stir everything together until the mixture is homogeneous.

Evenly fill the mushroom caps with the mixture and bake for about 12 minutes.  Serve over salad.