Mushroom Quesadillas

I didn't always love mushrooms.  In fact, there was a time when I couldn't stand them.  Now the smell of mushrooms browning in butter on the stove makes me salivate!  I don't care for them raw, but there's still time for that to change.  I wanted to do something different for lunch, rather than our normal salami, tomato, and pepperoncini pita sandwiches that I feel like we've been having every week, but mind you they are GOOD...

...so I dug up this recipe for Mushroom Quesadillas.  I remember bookmarking this awhile ago since it struck my interest with the simple addition of chili powder. 

You start by browning the mushrooms in butter by not moving them at all for the first 5 minutes, so they develop that golden brown hue.  After tossing them around so as to brown all sides, they are seasoned with chili powder and salt.  Add some chopped cilantro (I added more than the recipe called for, but I love cilantro), and the filling is done - extremely simple.

The next step was new for me.  I've never cooked quesadillas in the oven before, but I decided to give it a try.  First you warm the tortillias a bit over your gas burner, just until it blisters to give the tortilla that slight crispness that complements the gooey inside of a quesadilla.  Next, place shredded jack cheese on one half, top with the mushroom/cilantro mixture, and then finish it off with a sprinkling of feta cheese.  Fold them over, put a piece of foil on top of the quesadillas and let the oven do the work of melting the cheese.  They came out wonderfully, but not really sure I need to do them in the oven next time.  Stove top quesadillas work fine for me.  It was a great lunch on a beautiful spring day.

Boeuf Bourguignon - my first Julia Child recipe

Believe it or not, I hadn't watched Julie & Julia, until just recently.  I told myself I was going to see it when it was in the theater, but not being big movie-goers, we never got around to it.  Instead, we put it to the top of our Netflix queue just in time for the weekend.  When it arrived, I had the brilliant thought (as if I'm the only one that did this) to make Julia's Boeuf Bourguignon to complete our "dinner and a movie" evening.  Those who have made this recipe, know that is dish is like a 5-hour long event.  I was ready though; no plans the whole afternoon besides to cook - I was in heaven!


Even the shopping was fun.  I had never purchased pearl onions before.  They are like the dainty version of regular onions.  I also got to fully explore the wine aisles.  For everyday wine, I tend to stick to the California vineyards and also to $10 or less a bottle.  For this grocery trip, I perused the French land of Burgundy and Bordeaux.  After finding a moderately priced Bordeaux, I grabbed 2 bottles - one for the stew and one to pair with the dish.


Once at home, I began the labor of love.  After cooking up the bacon until lightly browned, I added my dry beef to the pot.  I took extra care to dry the beef in order to ensure proper browning.

I was careful to cook the meat in batches and not over-crowd the pan.  Once the meat was browned, I added the onions and carrots.  They smelled amazing while sauteing in the bacon and beef fat.  Then you complete a process of tossing the beef and vegetable mixture with flour and putting it in a hot oven for a few minutes, stirring, and then putting it  back in again.  Once the flour bonded to the ingredients, I poured the robust Bordeaux into the pot just until it covered the meat.  After adding tomato paste, a bundle of herbs, and garlic, back into the oven it went to simmer the hours away.

For the herbs, since they remain whole, I chose to wrap them neatly in cheesecloth and tie with a string - easier removal for later.  As the beef cooked to it's irresistible tenderness, I peeled, then simmered the dainty onions in butter, olive oil, beef stock, and herbs for about 40-50 minutes.

Once the meat was closer to being done, I also cooked up the mushrooms in their own separate pan.  (Lots of clean up with this recipe!).  I sauteed them in butter and olive oil and they browned up nicely in my new stainless steel All-Clad french skillet.

Finally, the stew was nearly ready.  I took it out of the oven, drained the the meat through a colander over a saucepan, skimmed the fat off the sauce, and combined it all with the pearl onions and mushrooms.  I probably wouldn't go through all of that straining and skimming again, since I'm not sure it really made a difference.  Low and behold, I had a finished product - Julia Child's Boeuf Bourguignon!

So I suppose I should add my thoughts about the movie, Julie & Julia.  I'm not sure how popular I will be after I say this, but I only thought the movie was so-so.  Just okay.  Maybe I had built it up in my mind so much that I was expecting something more?  As far as food movies go, it didn't inspire me nearly as much as some others, like Tortilla Soup and Mostly Martha.  I guess I didn't see the passion in her cooking, but more in her as a writer and with her contest she was working towards.  The movie was cute, enjoyable, but nothing I need to watch again.  There, I said it.  I'm still a foodie, believe me, and maybe I'm not alone with feeling this movie was a bit lack-luster considering the rich content they had to work with.  Would love to hear your thoughts. 

Halloween soup, sort of

Halloween on a Saturday!  What could be better?  If I had my son this year, it definitely could have been better, but since I didn't, I spent a good portion of the day cooking - big surprise.  Meanwhile, my boyfriend, Mark, was busy decking out the front porch with 2-4ft long fluorescent black lights to set the kids aglow.  The inspiration for finding exactly what to cook was spurred by a previous trip to the asian market, where I bought a huge bag of dried shiitake mushrooms (well, only 3 oz, but for dried mushrooms, that's pretty big).  Mark loves mushrooms, Ryan doesn't, so a night without Ryan meant we were going to consume at least some of those dried fungi in a Cream of Mushroom and Barley Soup.  

The recipe starts by bringing out the essence of shallots through sauteing them in butter and oil.  A simple, but beautiful dance of flavors.  Shallots are so aromatic and this recipe uses a whole cup of them!  Not the cheapest way to go, but quite worth it in the end.  Meanwhile, soaking in a hot bath, are the pungent dried shiitakes.  The recipe calls for dried porcini mushrooms, but since I had shiitakes, I went with that.

The rest of the vegetables are added to the softened shallots - mushrooms, both white and the rehydrated shiitakes, celery, and fresh sage.

After the vegetables relax together, they get coated lightly in flour and and then doused in a full cup of sherry.  Happy vegetables.  Everything is then simmered in broth and the reserved mushroom liquid.  The final addition is the cooked barley and 1/2 cup of sour cream to give it some velvety smoothness.  The best thing about this woodsy dish is that it is healthy too!

The soup was divine and the rest of the evening was quite enjoyable.  Our porch was definitely a place of entertainment for both kids and adults.  Who knew black lights could be such a draw?  Our trick-or-treaters were also privy to some dark, eerie music, provided by my own resident DJ Maleko (aka, my boyfriend Mark).

The street was quieting down, so we had to partake in the free blackjack taco from Taco Bell.  You all heard about that, right?  Free blackjack taco from 6pm - midnight on Halloween.  Don't tell me I was the only one who did that?!  It was a beautiful evening, so we strolled our neighborhood, coffee mugs in hand (minus the coffee but filled with beer), and ventured to our local Taco Bell.  The evening concluded with a hot sauce packet proposal.  Hot sauce packets with romantic sayings.  Hmm....what's next?