Friday, 21 December 2012

Say No To Nut Roast... A great vegetarian alternative for Christmas Dinner!

As a vegetarian (and a rather fussy eater!) I dread the food choices over the festive season, not being a huge fan of nut roast, which tends to being the ' festive vegetarian alternative', I dislike having it forced on me wherever I look, from a Christmas lunch with work, to a meal out with friends and then Christmas Dinner with the family.

Luckily for me, a few weeks ago I was invited down to join some fellow bloggers and the lovely folks from Aunt Bessies at London cookery school:  Food at 52. Not only did we have a great time and enjoyed some lovely wine and scrumptious food but we were also taught some tasty but simple recipes, and two of them are great ideas for vegetarian mains! (They would work just as well for starters for family members who eat meat) I'm sharing the first below and will be back with the next one soon...

Vegetarian Recipe - Festive Stuffed mushrooms - christmas dinner

Festive Stuffed Mushrooms

What you will need...(To serve 4 as a main)


8 large portobello mushrooms

2 shallots

25g of unsalted butter

2 tbsp of dried cranberries soaked in boiling water then chopped

2 tbsp toasted pine nuts

12g of soft goats cheese

2 tbsp of breadcrumbs

two sprigs of fresh thyme

olive oil to drizzle

salt and pepper to season

What to do

  • Preheat the oven to 200C (180C fan assisted)
  • Pull the stalks off the  mushrooms and chop finely with the shallots
  • Heat the butter and oil in a pan and fry the chopped stalks and shallots for 5 minutes until soft, then leave to cool
  • Drain the cranberries and add to the onion and mushroom  mixture with the pine nuts, thyme  and breadcrumbs, stirring well
  • Crumble in the goats cheese, season with salt and pepper, mix well  
  • Put the mushrooms on a baking sheet and  pop a small knob of butter into each mushroom (or drizzle in some olive oil if you prefer) then stuff  with the filling
  • Season and bake for 15-20 minutes 
 Then simply enjoy! At this time of year this is perfect with all the trimmings but could work equally well with a salad in the summer!

I was kindly sent some of the Aunt Bessies range to try some recipes at home.

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