Currabinny Cooks: You won't miss the beef in our easy mushroom stroganoff

And two of our favourite recipes using mushrooms

Mushroom Stroganoff with pan-fried potatoes. Picture: Bríd O'Donovan

I recently attended a wonderful pop-up dinner hosted by some talented young chef friends — Stefano Forte, Jack Farrelly and Jake McCarthy — where one of the courses included the most mind-blowingly delicious oyster mushrooms paired with asparagus and foraged wild garlic.

After I had demolished this beautiful dish, I found out I was in fact sitting beside the man who supplied the lads with the beautiful oyster mushrooms. Paddy Arnold and his business partner, James Egan, left their careers to open The Upcycle Farm: a truly sustainable business growing mushrooms using discarded coffee grounds. They partnered up with the café One Kind of Folk in Ranelagh, which provides the upcycle farm lads with all their fresh organic coffee ground needs.

In Ireland, we consume more than one million cups of coffee a day, with the majority of the grounds ending up in the bin. Their business provides an upcycling step to the life of a coffee bean, using it to provide the nutrients to grow oyster mushrooms. The mushrooms only take three weeks to grow in the strictly controlled environment the lads have set up in an old repurposed refrigerated trailer. The resulting mushrooms are organic, sustainable, upcycled, nutrient-rich and absolutely delicious.

As well as being a supplier of oyster mushrooms, The Upcycle Farm produces an unbelievably stunning jarred ragu, which they call revolution ragu. The oyster mushrooms are surprisingly meaty and lose very little of their water content when cooked, giving the ragu all the meatiness of a traditional beef ragu while being completely vegan. You can find jars of revolution ragu in loads of different food markets and co-ops around Dublin and Wicklow or they deliver nationwide if you order online from Harvest Day.

This perfect dish, using perfect mushrooms inspired me to challenge myself to start using more mushrooms, in all their wonderful varieties in my cooking. You see, I am not naturally a big mushroom lover, but when they are good quality, like the upcycle farm oysters and made with care like in the dish I had, I turn into a huge fan.

There is a lot more variety out there in terms of the different varieties of mushrooms available. In my local greengrocer, I can pick up lovely woody chestnuts, earthy hen-of-the-woods and lovely little shimejis all bunched together. I also recently picked up some lovely white beech mushrooms (a variety of shimeji) from a farmers market in Herbert Park. Other favourites include chanterelles, ceps, king oysters and forest namekos.

These are just a few of the things I have been cooking with mushrooms lately.

Mushroom miso broth

recipe by:Currabinny Cooks

This is one of my absolutely favourite things to make when I have a couple different varieties of mushrooms at hand. For this, I use a mixture of dried and fresh mushrooms.

Servings

4

Preparation Time

 10 mins

Cooking Time

 45 mins

Total Time

 55 mins

Course

 Starter

Cuisine

 Japanese

Ingredients

• 12 dried shiitake mushrooms

• 2-3 large king oysters, thinly sliced

• Bunch of maitake or hen-of-the-woods, broken up with hands

• White beech, larger pieces thinly sliced, small heads left whole

• Handful of coriander, roughly chopped

• 1 carrot, finely diced

• 1 stick of celery, diced

• 4 tsp miso paste

• 125g silken tofu, cubed

• Soy sauce

• Vegetable oil

Method

1. Soak the shiitake mushrooms in 1 litre of boiling water for around 15 minutes. In a large pot, heat a tablespoon or two of vegetable oil over medium-high and add the carrot and celery to the pot. Cook in the oil for around 5 minutes and then add the sliced king oyster mushrooms and larger white beech slices.

2. Stir everything together for a minute or two and then pour in one litre of boiling water along with the soaked shiitake mushrooms and the liquid they soaked in, making two litres altogether. Cover the pan and let simmer for 30 minutes.

3. Dissolve the miso paste in a little bowl with boiling water and pour it into the broth. Take the pan off the heat and add the smaller white beech and maitake mushrooms along with the cubes of tofu. Stir in a few tablespoons of soy sauce to taste and finally garnish with your chopped coriander.
   
   Picture: Bríd O'Donovan

Mushroom omelette with wild garlic pesto

recipe by:Currabinny Cooks

It is the start of wild garlic season here in Ireland so if you know of a patch, get out there and pick some. We usually take walk down to Phoenix Park where there are several good spots for wild garlic foraging. Some might say omelettes are a little basi

Servings

1

Preparation Time

 10 mins

Cooking Time

 5 mins

Total Time

 15 mins

Course

 Main

Cuisine

 Italian

Ingredients

• 3 organic eggs

• 50g butter

• 50ml double cream

• 100g mixed mushrooms, sliced thinly (chestnuts, oysters, chantarelles)

• 40g Gruyere

• Handful of parsley

• Sea salt and black pepper

• for the wild garlic pesto:

• 75g wild garlic, stalks removed

• 30g parsley, stalks removed

• juice of ½ lemon

• 80ml rapeseed oil

• 30g

• Parmesan

• 30g walnuts

• Salt and pepper

Method

1. First, make the pesto. In a food processor, blitz the ingredients for the pesto all together until a smooth paste is formed. You may also of course use a pestle and mortar for more rustic results. Decant into a sterilised jar and pour a little rapeseed oil over the top to seal. Refrigerate until needed.

2. Whisk together the eggs and cream in a bowl and season. Heat the butter in a large non-stick frying pan over medium heat. When the butter is bubbling add the mushrooms to the pan and fry for a few minutes until the mushroom start to become crispy.

3. Pour in the egg mixture and after a few seconds scatter over the gruyere. Push the cooked edges of the omelette to the centre of the pan, leaving some of the uncooked egg to cook along the edges.

4. Add a little more seasoning along with the chopped parsley. Flip over once, then twice until it is almost in a roll at one side of the pan, lastly flip over completely onto a warm plate.

5. Drizzle a little wild garlic pesto over it and serve with buttered toast.
   
   Picture: Bríd O'Donovan

Mushroom stroganoff

recipe by:Currabinny Cooks

This is a hearty, quick way to make stroganoff that packs a serious flavour punch. I usually use chestnut mushrooms for this, but oysters or even chantarelles would work well too. You can of course easily make this fully vegetarian by omitting the bacon.

Servings

2

Preparation Time

 10 mins

Cooking Time

 30 mins

Total Time

 40 mins

Course

 Main

Cuisine

 German

Ingredients

• 1 large rooster, peeled and diced into bite-sized pieces

• 150g chestnut mushrooms, thinly sliced

• 180g bacon lardons

• 2 tbsp brandy

• 2 tsp Dijon mustard

• 50ml double cream

• ½ tsp smoked paprika

• 60g butter

• 1 tbsp rapeseed oil

• Sea salt and black pepper

• Handful of chopped chives

Method

1. Place half of the butter and oil into a large frying pan over medium-high heat and add the potato cubes when the butter is bubbling. Season with salt and pepper.

2. Fry the spuds, tossing and stirring often for about 20 minutes until they are golden and crispy.

3. Take the potatoes out of the pan into a hot dish and loosely cover. Wipe the pan and return it to the heat, adding the rest of the butter and oil. Add the lardons first, letting them crisp up before adding the chestnut mushrooms along with the paprika.

4. When the chestnut mushrooms start to turn crispy, add the brandy to the pan, letting it bubble, forming a thick coating with the butter and bacon fat.

5. Add 100ml of water and let it almost all evaporate before removing the pan from the heat and stirring in the cream and Dijon mustard, making a smooth, yet still a little runny sauce.

6. Check the seasoning and serve with the crispy potatoes garnish with plenty of chopped chives.
   
   Picture: Bríd O'Donovan