Mushrooms

Today I had a lazy day and made soup. There were two baked potatoes left and also all the green peppers from the stuffing frenzy last Saturday. So I fried some onion, chopped the peppers and boiled them, together with an assortment of dried herbs and spices. Diced the potatoes and put them in at the end too. My latest favourite herb mix is dill, parsley, thyme, oregano and savory. In soups I've also started using Vegeta instead of salt. It's salt with some spices and is rather nice. But I should have put in a lot more than I did. Finally, when the soup was ready, I whisked two eggs together lightly and poured slowly into the hot soup, while stirring. This makes it look a bit thicker and "meatier" than just vegetables and water. It's a nice alternative to blending potatoes and mixing in.

Also something compelled me to buy large mushrooms on Friday. So today, I put the grill on low, then peeled the mushrooms (never wash, they just soak up more liquid) and placed upside down on the grill pan. I put some salt and pepper and a couple of thin slices of butter (really thin, like scrapings) and put them under the grill on the top shelf, then turned the grill down to it's lowest setting and left them there, not sure for how long, but kept an eye on them. when the butter seemed to be going a bit brown and burnt and I heard a couple of sputters, I moved the pan to the bottom shelf. When they looked ready, I took them out.

So, I served the soup with a big mushroom on top and I put some blue cheese on mine, absolutely yummy!

I used to get regular mushrooms at uni, peel them and take the stems off, then lay them out on a tray like little cups and I'd put small pieces of bacon, ham, garlic and butter or cheese in each, then bake under the grill. Not too healthy, but very nice fingerfood for the telly. On extreme days, I'd just do the mushrooms with only salt on top. The little cups would fill with liquid and I'd try to eat them without spilling. They weren't as nice when cold and/or reheated.