Mushrooms stuffed with olives, fetta and thyme with caramelised carrot, mash and saffron sauce

MUSHROOMS
VB recently posted a delightful number on mushrooms. So delightful, I decided I had to grow some. I took a trip to the local Agricultural Co-operative (try finding one of those in St. Kilda. . .) who fortunately had a pile of them. I followed the instructions, placed the little farm on top of my hot water heater out of direct sunlight and watered and waited. And watered . . . and waited. After a time, much longer than that indicated on the instructional panel on the box (many weeks in fact), little pin head sized mushrooms began to appear. And get larger and larger and larger. (to be fair, it is winter and my laundry is a poor accomodation for Mycelium at this time of year.)

This morning my wife said she wanted mushrooms stuffed with fetta and olives and a side salad of baby spinach and pine nuts for dinner.

So tonight I plucked the first of the fruiting bodies to have raised their pale heads from the dank mouldy compost. Almost saucer sized, firm and dry and perfect. There is something almost erotic about plucking the caps out of the farm box, the pinky brown gills so fine, so delicate and untouched, nary a finger laid upon them. An allegedly wise old friend said mushrooms are best picked the day before "to forget the ground", but I think that was just a drunken rambling not to be taken seriously, he was probably thinking of Pomelo forgetting the tree. Bollocks! The faster a mushroom goes from paddock to plate the better!

I decided to serve the stuffed caps atop the mash of some Dutch Cream potato. These are a wonderful all round potato that make a mash of wonderful texture and flavour. Just a little butter, seasoning and a splash of milk to ease it into a coarse whip is all that is required.

Stuffed mushrooms with mash, caramelised carrot, blanched green beans and saffron sauce.

Some large mushrooms: one per person, stem removed with a sharp knife
30 gm fetta per shroom
8 decent black olives per person (in decent oil too, or don't bother!)
4 ts semi-dried thyme leaves
20 gm pancetta per shroom, sliced coarsely and crisped off in the oven for garnish
olive oil to bake

Pit the olives and chop them coarsley, shred the thyme, add them to the fetta and mash it all together with the tip of a robust fork. Season and spoon into the mushroom cap. Oil up a baking tray and bake in a preheated oven (180 C) for abot 20-25 minutes.

The Mash:
200 gm Dutch Cream potato per person, peeled chopped and well drained
milk and butter to finish.

I wouldn't dare tell anyone how to make mash. (If you can't make mash you shouldn't be near a kitchen anyway!) All I will say is invest in a decent set of biscuit cutters to form up the mash to serve.

The Veg:
1/2 eschalot finely sliced per person one carrot per person, peeled and juliened
six beans per person, topped, tailed and blanched for 60 seconds
Slowly sweat off eschalot in a good knob of butter, add carrot, sweat off further until sweet. Arrange beans in pairs, top with carrot and apply sauce.

The Sauce:

Make about 700 ml of vegetable stock from sctratch. Reduce down to a thick, sweet, syrupy 150ml. Take off the heat. When the mushrooms are almost ready, add a decent pinch of saffron and let the edge of the flames lick the base of the sauce pan for long enough to colour up the sauce. Strain off the saffron and take off the heat. Slowly whisk in about 40gm unsalted butter.

I served mine like this:

Oh, I forgot to make a salad too. And I used the two smaller shrooms instead of on big one. Oops. Twas rather fine though. . .

Yellowfin tuna with saffron cabbage and sebago mash

Yellowfin tuna with saffron cabbage and sebago mash

Tonight was to be a Slow braised beef neck, slowly and succulently braised beneath a saucy chicken stock with mushrooms, but as I was about to enter the butcher's, the neighboring fishmonger had spotted me.

"The tuna has just arrived, it's still in the box." she yelled, hand cupped to mouth to direct her call.
Super fresh sashimi grade Yellowfin tunua or beef neck? Mmmm.
"It's a bit more expensive than usual, there hasn't been a lot of it around lately."

The young lad pulled out the tuna fillet and unwrapped it and showed it to me. The colour a gorgeous deep claret red, the flesh translucent and firm, smelling of the tuna, not of fish. Half a kilo should do for two, especially at $35/kg. Next stop: greengrocer. I discussed the merits of various spuds, (not being an expert) settling on some Sebagos to mash. I choose some savoy cabbage, just a quarter as I intend to saute with a little butter and saffron, some colour and soft crunch to offset the smoothness of the mash.

you'll need

500gm yellowfin tuna in one piece

for the cabbage
i x onion, sliced finely
1/8th savoy cabbage
1 ts saffron in 60ml hot water
50 gm-ish butter
seasoning

for the mash
3 x large sebago potatoes, scrubbed, peeled and diced
2 x cloves garlic, diced finely
60 gm butter
1/2 cup milk

for the beans
8 x beans per person
2 x lemongrass leaves

You'll need to get the mash and the cabbage going at the same time. The spuds for the mash can be done ahead of time if you keep them covered with water. Use a heavy based pan for the mash, that way you can finish it off and cover it and not have to worry about it later. Do the cabbage in a big non stick. Have a pot of fiercely boiling water ready for the beans, when it's their time. (They really don't need more than 2 mins to retain some bite.)

Oil a dinner plate and season it. Cut the tuna fillet in half lengthways, place on the oiled plate and season the upside too.

Julienne the cabbage and onion, toss in a pan with the butter. Add the saffron in water. keep adding water to soften the cabbage, but keep up the heat. You should have a gorgeous brown/red sort of caramelised finish to it.

Strain the spuds and mash manually with a masher. add the garlic and butter and milk, return to a low heat and stir with a wooden spoon. Turn the heat off and cover until ready to serve.

Start the tuna when the mash and cabbage are ready. Heat a griddle plate when you start doing the mash. Get it hot. Toss the tuna in the oil again and place it on the griddle. It only needs one minute a side, any more will overcook the fish, as I did after a few too many wines with this dish. When the fish is done, take it off the griddle and on to a room temperature plate.

Prepare an ice bath for the beans. (Keep a bag of ice in the freezer, throw four cups of ice into a steel mixing bowl and add cold water.) Tie the bundles of beans up with a leaf of lemongrass and blanch in the boiling water for two minutes maximum and refresh in the ice bath.

Take a 10cm pastry cutter and fill it in the middle of the plate full of mash, squaring off the top, then do the same on top of the mash with the cabbage. Place the tuna fillet on top, decorate with the beans and serve with a squeeze of lemon on top.

We enjoyed this with a 2007 Leeuuwin Estate 'Siblings' Sauvignon Blanc/Semillon from Margaret River. Which was perfect, but a SB or a buttery chardie would go just fine. Next time, I'll make a sauce. The combination of the mash and cabbage was sublime!