Stuffed Mushrooms on Herbed Rice…and the NEWTREE Chocolate Giveaway Winner!

Again, major annoyance at having to take dinner photos under harsh lighting thanks to dark fall nights…sorry for crappy pics!

Anytime I start to make stuffed mushrooms, my mom will repeat the adage: “Life’s too short to stuff a mushroom.”

Well, that’s because stuffed mushroom recipes are usually time-consuming and laborious, but this one will take you no more than 10 minutes to prepare, so what’s stopping you?

I have always made stuffed mushrooms using individual button mushrooms filled with a herb-and-garlic cream cheese mixture and they are delicious! Then I made Kate‘s leek stuffed mushrooms, which were also wonderful and made with portobellos, so they’re more filling as an actual meal and not just an appetizer. So I merged the two, added a few extra ingredients and came up with my best mushroom recipe yet!

The nutritional yeast and breadcrumbs provide a cheesy, crunchy topping while the cream cheese spread prevents the dish from becoming too dry. Serving the mushrooms on a bed of herbed rice provides added flavour and makes this dish a filling and well-rounded meal. And it can easily be made vegan!

Before I get to the recipe though, we have the small matter of a winner to announce! On Monday I announced a giveaway with a deliciously chocolatey prize – NEWTREE Chocolates will send one of my readers a box of 27 individually-wrapped chocolates in 9 amazing flavours for a Halloween trick-or-treat TREAT!

And the lucky winner is…

Congrats Sherry!

You were chosen at random by Randomized.com:

I’ll be emailing you later on today to sort out how to get you your prize. If you haven’t received an email from me by the end of the day, send me one at theguiltlesslife@gmail.com or Tweet me and let me know!

And here’s a little secret…there will be another giveaway on the blog on Monday! So come back!

Now back to that recipe…

(Earlier this week I referenced this dish in my What I Ate Wednesday post. Check next week for the recipe to the pumpkin oatmeal also featured in that post!)

INGREDIENTS (serves 2 as a main course):

2 portobello mushrooms
4 tbsp low-fat cream cheese (or vegan cream cheese)
Salt and pepper
Oregano
3 leeks, white and green parts thinly sliced
3 tsp extra virgin olive oil, separated
2 tsp minced garlic
1/4 cup sundried tomatoes, chopped
1/8 cup sliced almonds
2 tbsp breadcrumbs (omit for gluten-free)
2 tsp nutritional yeast

NOTE: A variation would be to omit the cream cheese and instead add crumbled goat cheese to the stuffing mixture at the same time as the breadcrumbs and nutritional yeast mixture.

DIRECTIONS:

1. Preheat oven to 400 F.

2. Scoop out the gills of the portobellos and rinse well. Spread 2 tbsp of the cream cheese inside each mushroom. Sprinkle with salt, pepper and oregano.

3. Heat 2 tsp of the oil in a large frying pan and add leeks. Stirfry for 6-8 minutes or until soft.

4. Add sundried tomatoes and almonds and cook for an additional minute. Take off the heat.

5. Mix breadcrumbs and nutritional yeast and add to the mixture. Stir well and then spoon mixture into mushrooms. Drizzle remaining teaspoon of olive oil over the top of each mushroom.

6. Bake for 12-15 minutes. Serve on herbed rice (recipe below).

Nutritional information per mushroom:

Herbed Rice (Sabzi Polo)

My best friend is Persian and I have been introduced to a delicious blend of Persian herbs through her amazing cooking. When I go to her family’s house for dinner they almost always serve sabzi polo (sometimes spelled polow), which means herbed rice in Farsi. The herbs they use have a distinct flavour that I love so I usually visit our local Persian food store and buy a specific herb mix for sabzi polo. If you have an Iranian food store close by give that a try! If not I offered a slightly different alternative, but inspired by sabzi polo, in the recipe below.

INGREDIENTS (serves 2):

1/2 cup basmati or wild rice
2 tsp dried dill
1/2 tsp dried fennel
1 tsp dried cilantro
1 tsp minced garlic
1 tsp extra virgin olive oil

DIRECTIONS:

1. Put rice and 1 cup water in saucepan and bring to a boil.

2. Reduce heat, add herbs and garlic and simmer until rice is cooked.

3. Add oil to cooked rice mixture, stir well and serve. Enjoy!

Nutritional information per serving of rice (if it serves 2):