Stuffed Mushrooms

The purpose of stuffed mushrooms is stuff, left over stuff. In this, the humble stuffed mushroom differs in its esthetics and ethics little from the raviolo, the kreplach, the shu mai, or any other members of the family Dumpling-idae, except in that the container is pretty tasty itself.

The only secret to stuffed mushrooms is to pour about a teaspoon of olive oil into the hollow of the cap itself and sprinkle with kosher salt and bake at 375º (the People's Committee is meeting to determine whether 350º or 375º is the People's Temperature) for 10 minutes before stuffing, thus rendering said 'shrooms more tender and juicy.

The filling this go-around was 3 slices of bacon (left over from I've forgotten what - we usually use crumbled sausage, but what the hell, this was there), 1/2 a small onion. fresh thyme and marjoram, the mushroom butts, and grinded-up bread (frozen scraps from the finger foods party), all chopped up fine (and dandy). Sautéed the onions in bacon, added the herbs and butts and then tossed in bread crumbs. Too dry, so I added a couple of frozen veal stock cubes (after a big poitrine de veau [farcie, braisée « à l’ancienne »] a couple of months back, we made tons of veal stock, which we saved by freezing it in ice cube trays à la pesto, then storing the cubes in paper bags in the freezer).

Back to 'shrooms. I let the stuffing cool (since I do not have Julia Child's asbestos hands). Scooped up into little bullets (not too tight), plopped into the hot mushrooms. Baked about 10 minutes more, then topped with a grated nubbin of mozzarella (from a salad) and baked until it bubbled.

See what I mean about left-overs?