Once upon a time I loathed mushrooms. I mean, really. I wouldn’t even consider eating them—I didn’t care if they were on pizza or piled high atop a filet. Didn’t matter. It wasn’t happening.

Then I got married.

My husband goes through these huge phases with different foods (I once caramelized onions every day for what was probably three or four months) and sure enough, mushrooms made the list. For a few weeks he wanted soft and juicy sauteed mushrooms in every meal that I could fit them. And one day? Well, I got hungry and took a bite.

Pleasantly surprised, I kept on eating. My aversion quickly turned to love and soon enough, I was the one who couldn’t get enough of mushrooms. These days I find myself including them in grilled sandwiches, pasta dishes and even grains. Sometimes I eat them (gasp!) plain as a side dish. It gets pretty crazy over here.

And then … then I saw Lauren’s recipe for Pizza Stuffed Mushrooms. Seriously? Could my life get any better? I knew they’d be happening—like, immediately. And they did. And they were to die for. And now I want to eat more. For breakfast.

Here’s how you make ‘em!

You need: baby bella stuffing mushrooms, cream cheese, green pepper, red onion, pepperoni, black olives, garlic salt or powder, dried basil and oregano and black pepper. And also some grated Parmesan or mozzarella cheese!

First up, clean those mushrooms. Using a damp rag or paper towel, simply wipe the dirt off each. Then remove the stem. It should pop right out.

In a bowl, mix together the cream cheese, grated cheese, garlic powder, basil, oregano, salt and pepper.

Add in the chopped green peppers, olives, pepperoni and red onion. Mix it together well.

Stuff about a teaspoon or so of the cheesy mix into each mushroom.

After every mushroom is stuffed, you want to bake them for 20 minutes. When 20 minutes has passed, switch on the broiler and broil until the cheese is golden and bubbly …

Just like this.

Serve warm, so the cheese is melty and creamy. Like a mini portable pizza!

We couldn’t believe how much the mushrooms really did taste like pizza. Even my husband, who isn’t a huge fan of black olives, scarfed three right out of the oven, searing his taste buds out of existence. These are truly fantastic and will surely be one of my go-to appetizers.

Thanks so much to Lauren’s for the recipe. Check out her fabulous blog Lauren’s Latest where she shares her incredible culinary creativity.

Printable Recipe

Pizza Stuffed Mushrooms

by Lauren's Latest on December 7, 2011 in Appetizers December 7, 2011 Appetizers

See post on Lauren's Latest’s site!

4.66 Mitt(s) 3 Rating(s)

Prep Time: 10 mins

Cook Time: 22 mins

Difficulty: Easy

Servings: 2

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Description

A great way to turn mushroom haters into lovers!

Ingredients

• 10 whole Baby Bella Or Crimini Mushrooms
• 4 ounces, weight Cream Cheese, Softened
• ¼ cups Grated Parmesan Or Mozzarella Cheese
• ¼ teaspoons Dried Basil
• ⅛ teaspoons Dried Oregano
• Garlic Salt And Pepper, To Taste
• ¼ cups Finely Diced Pepperoni
• 2 Tablespoons Finely Chopped Green Pepper
• 2 Tablespoons Finely Chopped Red Onion
• 2 Tablespoons Finely Chopped Black Olives

Preparation Instructions

Preheat oven to 350ºF. Spray two mini iron skillets with non stick cooking spray and set aside. (A sheet tray will work just fine, too!)

Wash mushrooms with a damp cloth and remove stems. (They should just pop out!) Set aside.

In a small bowl, stir cream cheese, parmesan, basil, oregano, garlic salt and pepper together until combined. Stir in remaining ingredients, excluding the mushrooms.

Spoon into prepared mushroom caps by the heaping teaspoonful. Place 5 in each skillet and bake 20 minutes. After 20 minutes, switch your oven from bake to broil and brown the tops of each mushroom. Remove and serve hot.

 
 
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Jessica Merchant is a personal trainer turned food writer and blogger. Her blog, How Sweet Eats, is where she proclaims her love for all things sweet, all things bacon, and everything else in between. She works her magic in her Pittsburgh kitchen, which she shares with her husband of 2 years.

I like to think of this dish as fancy fried chicken. It looks (and sounds) like it took some major slaving in the kitchen to achieve, when in reality it’s super simple.

Today’s recipe for Pollo en Salsa al Horno (Roasted Chicken in Sauce), brought to us by Tammy (aka San Pasqual’s Kitchen here on Tasty Kitchen), was one of firsts for me. I can’t remember having cooked traditional Spanish food before. What a lovely introduction! This was also my first time cooking with saffron. I am so glad that I did. The flavor is subtle but adds a beautiful touch of distinction.

Here are the step-by-step instructions so you can see just how easy it is to make:

These are all the ingredients that you’ll need: Chicken (I used thighs), wine, butter, flour onion, oil (I used coconut oil), saffron, salt, garlic and parsley.

First of all you’ll want to season your chicken with salt. Nobody wants to eat bland chicken.

Nest, coat it with the flour.

Heat your butter and oil in a large skillet.

Once your oil is hot, add the chicken. Careful! It’s gonna sizzle.

Cook until the chicken is nice and crispy and browned.

Transfer the chicken to a baking dish and preheat your oven to 350ºF.

Add the onion to the now-empty skillet of oil.

Meanwhile, as the onion is cooking, combine the parsley, garlic and saffron in a mortar.

Crush them all together.

Add the white wine and give it a stir.

Once the onions are nice and tender, stir in the flour and cook, stirring constantly, for another 2 minutes. Nobody wants to eat raw flour.

Add the wine mixture to the skillet and bring it all to a boil.

Pour the sauce over the chicken in the pan. I switched to a larger pan so that the sauce would more evenly cover the chicken.

Bake in the preheated oven for about 35-45 minutes, or until the chicken is cooked through.

Make sure you serve with lots of the flavorful sauce! I cooked up some couscous as an accompaniment (I know it’s not traditionally Spanish, but it sure was delicious and perfect for soaking up the sauce).

Note: I used virgin coconut oil to fry the chicken. I would recommend using expeller pressed coconut oil or some other less flavorful oil so that the saffron will shine through more clearly.

Thank you so much to Tammy for sharing this recipe with us. Stop by her blog, San Pasqual’s Kitchen, for more international recipes. Her Arrosto All’arancia (Roasted Pork with Orange Sauce) looks heavenly.

Printable Recipe

Pollo en Salsa al Horno (Roasted Chicken in Sauce)

by San Pasqual's Kitchen on January 31, 2014 in Main Courses, Poultry January 31, 2014 Main CoursesPoultry

See post on San Pasqual's Kitchen’s site!

0.00 Mitt(s) 0 Rating(s)

Prep Time: 30 mins

Cook Time: 1 hr

Difficulty: Intermediate

Servings: 4

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A remarkably tender chicken roasted in a saffron wine sauce. A Spanish wonder.

Ingredients

• ⅓ cups All-purpose Flour, Divided
• 4 pounds Chicken Parts
• Salt
• 1 cup Sunflower Oil
• 2-½ Tablespoons Butter
• 1  Small Onion
• 1 clove Garlic, Peeled
• 2  Sprigs Fresh Parsley
• 1 pinch Saffron Threads
• ¾ cups White Wine

Preparation Instructions

Reserve 1 tablespoon of the flour.

Season the chicken pieces with salt and coat them with the remaining flour.

Heat the oil with the butter in a skillet. Add the pieces of chicken and cook over medium heat until browned. Transfer to an ovenproof casserole.

Preheat oven to 350º.

Add the onion to the skillet and cook over low heat, stirring occasionally for about 10 minutes. While the onion is cooking, crush the garlic, parsley and saffron in a mortar and mix in the wine.

Stir the reserved flour into the onions and stir continuously for 2 minutes. Add in the wine mixture and bring to a boil, stirring continuously, then pour over the chicken.

Put the casserole in the oven and cook for 35 to 45 minutes until chicken is cooked through and tender.

¡Que aproveche! Enjoy!

 
 
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Erica Kastner has always been one of our most cherished members of the Tasty Kitchen community. She shares her wonderful recipes and amazing food photography on her blog, Buttered Side Up, and she also writes about crafts and posts more of her beautiful photography in her personal blog, Simple Days. There really isn’t much that this amazing young wife and mother can’t do, and we’re thrilled she does some of it here.

This is the second in a two-recipe series for Kikkoman, a sponsor of Tasty Kitchen. The other recipe I posted here was for Panko Mozzarella Sticks (highly recommend!) and I continue to get positive feedback from those of you who’ve made them. For this one, I used a whole different Kikkoman product and made…fajitas!

 
Mmmm, does my house smell yummy. If you walked in right now, you’d drool.

 
Then you’d faint when you saw my laundry pile. But that’s another story!

Grab a sirloin steak and throw it into a dish or a Ziploc bag.

This is Ponzu sauce!

Pour it over the beef, add some lime juice, then cover it with plastic wrap (or seal the bag) and refrigerate it for at least a few hours. I like to do this step in the morning and let it marinate all day!)

Separately, slice two chicken breasts into strips and throw it in a bowl or plastic bag. Pour the ponzu sauce (with lime juice) over the top, cover (or seal) and marinate.

 
Now go…live your life!

To make the fajitas, wrap a stack of flour tortillas in aluminum foil and warm in the oven. (Though I went for the storebought stuff this time, try making homemade tortillas if you have the time—you won’t regret it!)

Slice up the veggies. I used onion and three colors of bell peppers because I love color, and because they were in my fridge! But I have made fajitas using sliced mushrooms, zucchini, and summer squash—anything you have on hand.

Heat some canola oil in a large skillet over high heat. You want to sizzle these veggie, baby!

Throw in the veggies and pour in a little Ponzu.

Let them cook over high heat for 4 to 5 minutes, or until they get a little color. You don’t want them to be soggy, though, so taste along the way and remove them while they’re still crisp.

Remove them to a plate and keep warm.

Grill up the steak until medium rare, about 1 1/2 to 2 minutes on both sides.

Remove the steak to a cutting board and let it rest while you cook the chicken.

Throw the chicken into the same skillet in which you cooked the veggies.

Flip and cook the chicken until it’s nice and brown (and done), then pour it onto a plate. Remove the tortillas from the oven and get whatever fixins you’d like: sour cream, cilantro, pico de gallo, guacamole (or just sliced avocado), chopped olives—just go for it!

Throw the veggies on the tortilla…

Then throw on the chicken.

Then I threw on some cheddar…

And sour cream, because I’m a bad, bad girl.

As for the beef, slice it very thinly. You’ll notice I took two different approaches with the chicken and the beef. For the chicken, I sliced it up, then marinated it, then cooked it. But for the beef, if you slice it before you cook it, you won’t be able to achieve medium rare doneness—it’ll cook too much and too fast. So I like to grill it in one piece, then slice away.

Pink and beautiful!

I loved these so much, I’m actually considering serving fajitas for our Fourth of July party. I can do a huge iron skillet on the grill itself, grill several sirloins, then just have a big spread set up with all the fixins.

It’ll be a mess…but a delicious one.

Enjoy! Here’s a link to the printable recipe: Ponzu Beef and Chicken Fajitas

I have a new addiction but luckily this time, it’s not quite as unhealthy as my last (ahem … Kit Kats) or budget-breaking as the one before that (ahem … fresh oysters from the Pacific Northwest). It’s all my friend Jennifer’s fault. She gushed on about her new popcorn maker—the stand-alone, old-fashioned design complete with the crank to empty the popping bin.

It’s an absolutely impractical space-hogging small kitchen appliance that only people who have a popcorn fixation (moi) could justify. And so there it sits on my kitchen island, taking up 55% of the counter footprint, leaving no room for anything else.

Of course, my husband Scott just shakes his head and says, “We’ll see how long this popcorn thing lasts …” So what am I to do? Well, I make popcorn. Buckets of it. Every few hours.

Okay, so honestly, my addiction isn’t so much eating the popcorn but rather making it. And if I have to hang my head in shame, stand in the corner, and really, really dig down deep for the absolute truthful answer, the popcorn-making frenzy is all about warding off the “I told you it was a bad idea” thing from Scott!

C’mon, please tell me you do the same thing too?

Of the gazillion popcorn combos that I’ve made (and have sourced from Twitter friends!), my favorite is the Popcorn with Parmesan and Truffle Oil. It’s a great way to glam up the humble popcorn! (Though I think popcorn stopped being humble the moment I bought that fancy $80 popcorn maker.)

The first step is to pop yer corn. If you’re doing the microwave thing, make sure you get plain popcorn. If you want to make popcorn on your stove (like your grandma use to do), here’s a recipe from Elise.

Once it’s popped, put the popcorn in a large bowl and drizzle just 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon of the truffle oil (truffle oil is very strong!). If you have an oil mister, even better.

 
 
 
Mix it all about. The oil goes first, so that it coats the popcorn and gives the salt and parmesan something to stick to.

 
 
 
Now add the sea salt. It’s gotta be good sea salt, like my favorite flaky Maldon sea salt. Hey, if you’re gonna use truffle oil and good parmesan, you might as well use good salt!

 
 
 
And then add a generous grating of good quality parmesan or pecorino.

 
 
 
To finish, just because this is glam popcorn, I use a vegetable peeler to add some nice shavings of parmesan on top.

 
 
 
What’s your favorite popcorn flavor? Got any creative ideas for me? I’ve got at least another 2 weeks of popcorn frenzy before I can safely retire the monster in my garage AND minimize the “I told you so’s.”

 
Hugs and kisses,
Jaden

 
 
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Jaden Hair is a food writer, television personality, and food photographer based in Tampa Bay, Florida. Find more of her recipes in her blog, Steamy Kitchen, where you can also read more about Jaden’s new book, The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook, and the rave reviews it’s received!

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