“Cooking with Mushrooms: A Fungi Lover’s Guide to the World’s Most Versatile, Flavorful, Health-Boosting Ingredients” is a mushroom lover’s paradise. The book includes nearly 100 recipes that explore the array of mushroom varieties and their flavor profiles.
Author Andrea Gentl includes information on how to grow your own mushrooms, plus how to make and use dried mushrooms. Recipes include dishes like morels on fried sourdough with smashed favas and peas, roast chicken with miso-mushroom butter, and maple mushroom ice cream. The reader will come away with new ideas for using mushrooms as both a flavor enhancer and a food.
Gentl raises the possibilities on how to best incorporate mushrooms in surprising ways. How about mushroom powder sprinkled over granola or schnitzel with king trumpet mushrooms?
I was intrigued by the enoki alfredo. Simple to put together, the mushrooms act as the pasta here. Enoki mushrooms grow in a bundle of ghostly white strands. Once trimmed, each bundle can be separated into a pile of individual mushrooms. They are delicate and a little crunchy when cooked. When thrown into salted boiling water, the mushrooms take on an angel hair pasta-like appearance.
This dish is an incredibly simple nod to two classic Italian pastas—Alfredo and cacio e pepe—with just a handful of ingredients: enoki, butter, Parmesan, black pepper, grated nutmeg, and a drizzle of olive oil at the finish for extra gloss. It’s a perfect recipe for anyone who doesn’t eat gluten but wants the indulgence of saucy, creamy pasta for dinner. One wonders if enoki could be the new spaghetti squash. A Russian River pinot noir would be a lovely accompaniment.
Enoki Alfredo
Serves 2
- Coarse salt
- 1 pound (455 grams) enoki mushrooms
- 4 tablespoons (2 ounces/60 grams) unsalted butter, cut into 1-tablespoon pieces
- 2 ounces (60 grams) finely grated Parmesan (you should get a little more than 1/2 cup)
- 1 teaspoon cracked black pepper
- Freshly grated nutmeg
- Extra-virgin olive oil, for drizzling
Bring a pot of generously salted water to a boil.
Trim the enoki and separate the strands into piles. Cook the mushrooms in the boiling water for 1 1/2 minutes. Reserve 1/4 cup cooking liquid and drain the mushrooms.
Return the mushrooms to the pot. Add the butter, stirring until melted. Add the parmesan and stir vigorously until the sauce is glossy and creamy. Add a little of the reserved cooking water, if needed.
Top with pepper, a scant grating of nutmeg, and a drizzle of oil and serve.
Art excerpted from “Cooking with Mushrooms: A Fungi Lover’s Guide to the World’s Most Versatile, Flavorful, Health-Boosting Ingredients” by Andrea Gentl. Artisan Books copyright 2022.
