Oven Baked Wild Mushroom Risotto

I am not sure where I stumbled across this recipe, but it is delicious. This was my first time making risotto and I can say with certainty that I will be making it again. I really like mushrooms and this has a great mushroom and Parmesan cheese flavor. We ate it as a meal and it is very filling. However, I am thinking that the next time I make steaks...this would be a great side.

Oven Baked Wild Mushroom Risotto
Serves 2 as a main or 4 as a side dish

INGREDIENTS:
1/2 ounce dried porcini mushrooms
8 ounces fresh, dark gilled mushrooms
2 1/2 ounces butter
1 medium onion, peeled and finely chopped
7 ounces Italian Carnoli rice
5 ounces chicken stock
2 tablespoons freshly grated parmesan cheese
salt and black pepper to taste

To finish:
2 ounces parmesan cheese, shaved into flakes
1 tablespoon chopped fresh flat parsley

DIRECTIONS:
Preheat the oven to 300 degrees. Place the dried mushrooms in a bowl with 2 cups of boiling water poured over them. Set aside to soak for 30 minutes. Slice the remaining mushrooms about 1/4 inch thick.

Melt the butter in a medium saucepan and add the onion. Cook it over gentle heat for about 5 minutes to soften, then add the sliced mushrooms, stir well and leave to the side for the time being.

When the dried mushrooms have had their half hour soak, place a sieve over a bowl. Line with a double sheet of paper towels and strain the mushrooms through this, reserving the liquid in the bowl beneath. Chop the mushrooms finely and then add them to the mushroom mixture in the pan. Keep the heat low and let the onions and mushroom sweat gently for about 20 minutes, in order to release all their juices and flavour. Do not colour.

Put a shallow casserole dish into the oven to warm.

Add the rice to the mushroom mixture and give it a good stir to coat it with butter. Add the chicken stock along with the strained mushroom liquid. Season to taste with some salt and freshly ground black pepper. Bring up to the simmering point, then pour the whole mixture into the warmed casserole dish. Stir once and then place it on shelf in the middle of the oven, uncovered, and bake for 20 minutes exactly.

Remove from the oven and gently stir in the grated parmesan cheese, turning the rice grains over. Put back in the oven and bake for 15 minutes further. Remove from the oven and serve immediately, spooned out onto warm plates and garnished with the shavings of parmesan cheese and a sprinkling of parsley.

Pumpkin Roll

It seems that I have been making a ton of "roll" type foods lately. First the turkey roulade, then the lasagna rollups and now a pumpkin roll. I got this recipe from my friend and I just couldn't pass it up. It is so awesome. I was a tad nervous to try it and thought that I would probably mess it up. The whole wrapping it up in a kitchen towel was quite foreign and seemed so odd.

I am VERY glad that I did. We have eaten over half of this today and I made it early this afternoon. DELICIOUS. It is also quite festive!

CAKE INGREDIENTS:
1/4 cup powdered sugar (to sprinkle on towel)
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 large eggs
1 cup granulated sugar
2/3 cup pure pumpkin
1 cup walnuts, chopped (optional)

FILLING INGREDIENTS:
1 pkg. (8 oz.) cream cheese, at room temperature
1 cup powdered sugar, sifted
6 tablespoons butter or margarine, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Powdered sugar (optional for decoration)

DIRECTIONS FOR CAKE:
Preheat oven to 375° F. Grease 15 x 10-inch jelly-roll pan; line with wax paper. Grease and flour paper. Sprinkle a thin, cotton kitchen towel with powdered sugar.
Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, cloves and salt in small bowl. Beat eggs and granulated sugar in large mixer bowl until thick. Beat in pumpkin. Stir in flour mixture. Spread evenly into prepared pan. Sprinkle with nuts.
Bake for 13 to 15 minutes or until top of cake springs back when touched. (If using a dark-colored pan, begin checking for doneness at 11 minutes.) Immediately loosen and turn cake onto prepared towel. Carefully peel off paper. Roll up cake and towel together, starting with narrow end. Cool on wire rack.

DIRECTIONS FOR FILLING:
Beat cream cheese, 1 cup powdered sugar, butter and vanilla extract in small mixer bowl until smooth. Carefully unroll cake. Spread cream cheese mixture over cake. Reroll cake. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate at least one hour. Sprinkle with powdered sugar before serving, if desired.

COOKING TIP: Be sure to put enough powdered sugar on the towel when rolling up the cake so it will not stick.

Portobello Lasagna Rollups w/ Easy Tomato Sauce - CEiMB

Marthe from Culinary Delights chose the recipe this week for CEiMB. I love mushrooms, spinach and lasagna. So I was excited. I also decided to go ahead and make the Easy Marinara Sauce recipe that went with the roll-ups.



I considered buying the Prego Traditional (my favorite) but thought it may be fun to try and make it myself. Now I am thinking that I may have liked it better with Prego.

The Easy Tomato sauce was just as the recipe describes, easy. However, it took a lot of time. I thought that it was kind of bland and tasted very tomato-like. OK. I am not doing a good job explaining. Maybe I should have added a little sugar or something to the sauce to spice or sweeten it up.

The roll-ups consisted of whole wheat lasagna noodles, ricotta cheese, egg, and spinach. That mixture was layed onto each noodle and then topped with mushrooms and marinara sauce. Each individual noodle was then rolled and placed in a baking dish. All 12 noodles were then topped with more marinara sauce, mozzeralla and parmesan cheese. It cooked for 1 hour.

My husband really enjoyed this. But he also really likes tomatoes. I thought that the roll-ups were good and concluded that I just didn't care for the sauce. Next time I will use Prego! Good choice Marthe. Check out what everyone else thought about the roll-ups and visit Marthe's site for the recipe. Or click HERE!

Quintuple Chocolate Brownies - TWD

Back in January when TWD just began, this recipe was chosen by Chelle from Sugar & Spice. Check out her blog for the recipe or find it on pages 99-100 in the cookbook. You will also find an outstanding pictures of the brownies there as well. Since I am determined to make all the recipes that have already been chosen, I decided to make these for a donation to my child's school bake sale. They have 5 different types of chocolate and 2 tablespoons of coffee and chopped nuts. I wanted to use peanuts, but I was out. The brownies were easy to put together. However, my white chocolate topping did not look very pretty. It was almost a see through and not like the picture in the cookbook. Not sure what I did wrong. My photos were also terrible and I will not post them.

As for the taste, I thought that they were OK. My husband and boys really liked them though. I concluded that the coffee taste was a little strong. I just don't like coffee and was surprised that the boys enjoyed them as much as they did. Maybe next time I will add only 1 tablespoon of coffee.

Kugelhopf - TWD

The past 2 chosen recipes for TWD have been things that I have never eaten or heard of, much less able to pronounce. But I guess that is the fun of this. You try new things, cook new things and learn. This week's recipe was chosen by Landa from The All-purpose Girl. If you would like the recipe, you can find it posted HERE on her blog or on pages 61-63 in the cookbook.

I obviously didn't have a kugelhof pan so I bought a silicone bundt pan for this assignment. This recipe was very involved. It took an entire afternoon to get my initial dough to rise, slap down, rise again, slap down, rise again....you get the point. I was shocked when it said to refrigerate it overnight. I was sure that it would kill the yeast. Little did I know! I made some polish doughnuts earlier this year that involved yeast. The results were disastrous the first couple of times. I didn't give up though and required a lot of help from my great aunt. Eventually I figured it out and am happy to say that I succeeded on the first time with this recipe as well.

I used raisins and made the recipe exactly as Dorie called for. I did consider using mini chocolate chips but decided against it at the last minute. I wanted to get rid of some of the raisins in my cupboard.
First I boiled some water to steep my raisins. However, the pictures did not turn out. Next, I used barely warm milk and dissolved the yeast in it. I then added flour and salt to the milk/yeast mixture.

The eggs (2 eggs and 1 yolk) were lightly mixed and added to the dry mixture above.

I added the sugar and 8 tablespoons of soft butter little by little to the batter. It was fun to use my dough hook for my mixer that I rarely get to use. I must have kneaded the batter for a good 10 minutes at least.

The raisins were added to the batter. I let it raise, then slapped it down several times. The process was a long one! It then slept in the refrigerator overnight. In the morning, I set my oven to 200 degrees and popped the dough into my new pan. I let it sit on the stove top for 3+ hours. It rose almost to double in size. Into the oven it went where it cooked for 10 minutes. I tented it with some tin foil and let it cook another 15 minutes.

After it came out of the oven, I used a pastry brush and drenched 4 tablespoons of melted butter on the top. I used a ton of powdered sugar and sprinkled it on top. It looked very nice.

As for the taste....it wasn't bad, just not that great. The cake is very airy and light. It doesn't have much flavor to it though which was disappointing. I did like the raisins and probably would have really liked chocolate chips and vanilla in it. Maybe next time? Probably not! I am proud that I made it and had another victory with yeast, however, I didn't enjoy how much time it took to make.

Thanks Landa for picking the recipe this week. It is fun to try new recipes!

Fun Giveaway

I love entering to win these giveaways. Even though I never do. Whitney is giving away these fun, colorful dishes!! All you have to do is visit her blog and leave a comment to be entered. How easy is that?

Zucchini Brownies

INGREDIENTS:
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 1/2 cups white sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 cups shredded zucchini
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

6 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
1/4 cup margarine
2 cups confectioners’ sugar
1/4 cup milk
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

DIRECTIONS:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour a 9×13 inch baking pan.
In a large bowl, mix together the oil, sugar and 2 teaspoons vanilla until well blended. Combine the flour, 1/2 cup cocoa, baking soda and salt; stir into the sugar mixture. Fold in the zucchini and walnuts. Spread evenly into the prepared pan.
Bake for 25 to 30 minutes in the preheated oven, until brownies spring back when gently touched. To make the frosting, melt together the 6 tablespoons of cocoa and margarine; set aside to cool. In a medium bowl, blend together the confectioners’ sugar, milk and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla. Stir in the cocoa mixture. Spread over cooled brownies before cutting into squares.

NOTES: These were delicious. Of course, I skipped the walnuts. The frosting is good too. However, next time I think that I will not do the frosting and just sprinkle powdered sugar over the top. I didn’t get a chance to take a picture of mine because we were leaving for camping. So I just used the photo from where I got the recipe, All Recipes.

I posted this recipe originally on my old blog on 8/25/08.