A House Divided: Mushroom Edition

I love mushrooms. I love them raw, sliced into spinach salads. I love making homemade mushroom soup to use in casseroles. I love them on pizza. ManO does not. And that "does not" is more than on his pizza.

Oh no! There is a mushroom on ManO's ham side of the pizza. Much bemoaning occurred!

Now pizza is an easy thing to compromise on. Each person gets their half to do with what they will. But other recipes are far more difficult.

I invited my friend Cathy over to celebrate her birthday and be a part of The Great Dining Room experiment. You know you have a good friend when you make her sit in the middle of a room torn apart. Nope, you can't see the chaos. I'm smart that way. But we haven't used the room in ten years and something had to be done. That's what this experiment got me. More on that next week.

 In ManO's childhood kitchen, the table's almost an antique.

Cathy also loves mushrooms. You might think I could fix something mushroom related no stress but I also planned serving ManO the same dish for dinner. I knew I wanted to fix zucchini lasagna You can find the DIY here.  But I really wanted to hide, I mean, layer the lasagna with mushrooms. But ManO is too smart for that.

That's when it hit me. Steak houses, at least the good ones, serve a sauteed mushroom side dish so customers can spoon the mushrooms over the steak. Why not do the same with lasagna?

Oh my goodness! Delish! Instructions below.

Thanks to Jan Drexler's quick cheesecake dessert , I revisited my gluten free cheesecake recipe  and experimented with both the crust and putting it in custard cups. I used my berry-sauce topped baked cheesecake because of the added protein. But if you want to make it no bake simply use organic confectioners sugar, cream cheese and whipped cream to thin and chill.  I could have easily done the crust with gluten-free chocolate cookies and corn syrup free homemade chocolate sauce and peanuts or pecans as a base with cane sugar caramel sauce.

The bottom line is we had a great lunch and I didn't have to cook ManO an entirely new dinner!

Easy Sauteed Mushrooms

1 pint washed and sliced mushrooms
1 or 2 tablespoons butter
1 or 2 tablespoons olive oil
minced garlic to taste (optional)

Melt butter with olive oil over medium heat.
Add minced garlic and stir. 
Saute until cooked but NOT limp.
Serve over veggies, meat or as a side.

So, what about you? Do you have a love or hate affair with mushrooms? Is there something you've given up because no one else in the house loves a particular food or ingredient?

A Fungus Among Us

What at lovely day it is. The birds are singing, the trees are budding, flowers are blooming...and you're here at the cafe. :) So good to see you again.

One of my favorite foods is mushrooms. I love them on pizza, in my salad and I especially love them sauteed. Best of all, it quick and super easy.

All you need are some mushrooms, whatever kind you like (I used just plain old button mushrooms this time), some minced garlic and some olive oil.

You can slice your mushrooms or leave them whole. You can remove the stems or cook those too.

Whatever you like. This is very flexible.

Now heat your olive oil over medium to medium-high heat. You don't want it to smoke, though.

Now add your garlic and let it cook just long enough to infuse the oil with that wonderful garlic flavor (1-2 minutes).

Add your mushies and toss to coat with the oil.

Remember that mushrooms are one of those veggies with a high water content. That means they cook down a lot, so take that into consideration if you're making these for several people.

Now I'll sprinkle them with just a little bit of salt (and pepper, if you like) and give them one more toss.

Ah...perfection.

I love to put these on steak or just eat them by themselves. Which is what I did this time. 

The best thing is that there's no guilt. Whoo-hoo!

Speaking of guilt...

I knew those 4 pounds last week were too good to be true. I actually gained .2 pounds this week, despite making what I thought were wise choices in my eating. 

But as I've said before, it's a sawtooth pattern. Some days up, some days down. 

And I will not give up. 

I just need to dig my heels in and hang on for what's sure to be a long, bumpy ride. :-)