Mushrooms stuffed with sun-dried tomatoes, Dauphinoise potatoes and aubergine rolls with pesto, tiramisu

On Sunday I’d offered to cook a three course meal that’s a bit different from what we usually eat. I virtually never cook and when I do it’s always just something quick. I don’t enjoy cooking, but I thought I’d give it a go anyway. Although these recipes were very simple, by the time the day came I was feeling quite nervous.

Ingredients ^

I used the following recipes as a basis, reducing to serve 2:

I couldn’t find aubergines anywhere (tried 3 big supermarkets) so had to settle for baby aubergines which of course weren’t big enough to wrap anything in.

Method ^

Mushrooms stuffed with sun-dried tomatoes ^

  • Preheat oven to 200C.
  • Soak about 8g sun-dried tomatoes in a small bowl of hot water, covered for 5 minutes.
  • Reserve a tablespoon of the liquid, drain the rest off and chop the tomatoes finely.
  • Chop off the mushroom stems and chop them finely.
  • Finely chop 1/8th cup of shallots.
  • Finely chop a clove of garlic.
  • Lightly beat a large egg yolk.
  • Mince 1/8th cup of parsley leaves.
  • Crumble 1/4 teaspoon of basil.
  • Heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a frying pan over moderate heat until hot but not steaming. Add the mushroom stems and shallots, stirring until shallots are softened.
  • In a bowl stir together the mushroom stems, shallots, 1/6th cup bread crumbs, sun-dried tomatoes, the reserved liquid, the egg yolk, parsely, basil and garlic. Add salt to taste. Mound into the mushroom caps.
  • Brush the mushroom caps with sun-dried tomato oil.
  • Arrange the cups in a lightly greased shallow baking dish.
  • Sprinkle the caps with 2 tablespoons of grated parmesan.
  • Bake in the middle of the oven for 15 minutes.

Aubergine rolls with pesto ^

  • Preheat oven to 180C.
  • Cut 1 small carrot into matchsticks.
  • Deseed and slice half a red pepper.
  • Trim 8 asparagus spears.
  • Chop half a clove of garlic.
  • Finely grate 40g parmesan.
  • Top and tail 2 aubergines. Slice aubergines lengthways into about 8 4-5mm thick strips. Add salt and pepper, brush with extra-virgin olive oil and set aside for 5 minutes. Since I only had baby aubergines I could only slice them into small thin chips at this point.
  • Brush a pan with olive oil, place over high heat, cook aubergines for 2 minutes each side. Set aside.
  • Blanch vegetables in boiling water:
    • Carrots: 3 minutes
    • Pepper: 2 minutes
    • Asparagus: 1 minute

    Drain, pat dry and set aside.

  • Coarsely blend the garlic, 50g of drained sun-dried tomatoes and 1 tablespoon of pine nuts.
  • Add 10g fresh basil, the parmesan, and 65ml extra-virgin olive oil and blend again. Season and stir in 1 tablespoon of double cream.
  • Lay the vegetables at the end of each aubergine slice, roll up to secure and place in a large baking dish. Drizzle with extra-virgin olive oil and bake for 6-7 minutes or until hot.
  • Serve with pesto, garnish with lemon and salad leaves.

Dauphinoise potatoes ^

  • Preheat oven to 190C.
  • Thinly slice half an onion.
  • Slice 500g of King Edward potatoes thinly with a mandolin.
  • Grease up a shallow baking dish with butter (I used Pure soy spread).
  • Mix ~140ml double cream and ~40ml milk.
  • Layer the potatoes and onions evenly in the dish. Pour the cream and milk over, dot over with butter and cover the dish with foil.
  • Bake for one hour.
  • Discard the foil and bake for a further 15-20 minutes or until potatoes are golden.

Tiramisu ^

  • Sift ~22g icing sugar into ~112g mascarpone. Add 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract and 2 tablespoons of Tia Maria.
  • In a separate bowl, whisk ~85ml of double cream until soft peaks form.
  • Mix the cream and mascarpone together and refrigerate.
  • Break some sponge fingers to size and briefly dip them in cold, strong coffee.
  • Place the sponge fingers in the bottom of serving glasses and spoon mascarpone cream over.
  • Grate chocolate on top before serving.

Conclusion ^

We were pretty pleased with how it turned out, very yummy! Things I’d change:

Presentation could have been better. The vegetables on a bed of aubergines should have been aubergine wraps, but I couldn’t find big enough aubergines. Easy enough to fix. The Dauphinoise potatoes would have looked a lot better if they’d been nice equal sizes and shapes but I only had a grater to slice them with and it was the first time I’d tried. I might have done better with a proper mandolin, and/or more practice.

The Dauphinoise potatoes were rather too creamy for my liking, but Jenny really liked them. Maybe not so much a change needed as simply smaller portions for me; not a huge fan of potatoes.

There was probably a bit too much parmesan in everything, especially the stuffing for the mushrooms. That could have done with being toned down a bit.

No complaints about the Tiramisu!