Mushroom Toasts (or: Finally, a recipe!)

At long last, a recipe!

As I mentioned yesterday, MK and I enjoyed a little appetizer-ish spread for our New Year's Feast. One of the things I made was these little mushroom toasts (for lack of a better name). I was invited (grudgingly, I believe) to a co-worker's party once, and the host(s) served a similar mushroom appetizer there. When I asked for the recipe, I was given a passing attempt at a list of ingredients, and replicated it the best I could.

This recipe has two main components: mushrooms and bread. I personally prefer shiitake mushrooms for this, but you can really use whatever you like. I would recommend that if you are using baby bellas or white buttons, slice the mushrooms very thin. I would stay way from portobella mushrooms unless you feel like doing a lot of extra prep work (scraping out the gills, slicing them up). Generally, I would go with a more "meaty" mushroom, so to speak.

As for the bread, I always use a nice, crusty French baguette. You could use any type of bread you like, but I would stick with a bread that can easily be easily sliced into small toasts. Just as a note, if you use a crusty bread, only toast one side. If you use a softer bread, then I would say oil and toast both sides.

You can easily adapt this recipe to your own flavor tastes, too. Don't care for sherry? Maybe try white wine or lemon juice. Not a fan of thyme and/or sage? Try parsley or rosemary instead.

Lastly, the measurements listed in the recipe are really just estimates. One of the downfalls of cooking "off the cuff", so to speak, is that it can make it extremely difficult to share your recipes, but here's my best try.

Mushroom Toasts
Ingredients
1 French baguette
Light olive oil
1 lb mushrooms, sliced thin (for round) and sliced in strips (for wild)
1 Tbsp butter
1 shallot, diced finely
1/3 - 1/2 cup sherry cooking wine (if you're going to use just sherry, I'd cut this down to 1/4 to 1/3 cup)
2 tsps fresh thyme
2 tsps fresh sage, chopped finely
Kosher salt
Fresh ground black pepper

Directions
Heat a grill pan over medium-high heat. Slice the bread into about 1/2" thick slices. Lightly drizzle one side of the bread slices with light olive oil. Place oil-side down on grill pan, and let grill until edges just begin to brown. (Keep an eye on them - they can start to burn quickly.)

Melt the butter over medium high heat, and add mushrooms. Sprinkle with Kosher salt and freshly cracked pepper. Let mushrooms cook down until they have let out pretty much all of their liquid, stirring occasionally. Mushrooms are done when they start to turn golden brown on the edges.

Add sherry to mushrooms, and continue to cook, letting sherry reduce by about half. Sprinkle thyme and sage over, and stir in. Let cook for about 3 - 5 more minutes. Serve mushroom mixture over toasts.