Stuffed mushrooms…the solution when you feel like pizza but know you shouldn’t

To be honest, I don’t ever crave pizza. For Reis however, this is not the case. When he plants the seed of thought ‘wouldn’t it be nice to just get pizza tonight – it tastes amazing and its no fuss’, I find it can be tempting to consider getting take away pizza (disgusting I know, but on a Friday night when I’m exhausted after work, this can be the situation I face!). So, to conquer this conundrum, I’ve come up with an alternative recipe, which tastes just like pizza (Reis even said so without me mentioning it!) yet it is without the bread base and is completely natural. Stuffed mushrooms.

I know you don’t believe me, so you will just have to try it. I was also inspired by my stuffed eggplant recipe and the beautiful mushrooms I buy here (seriously, fresh mushrooms are like nothing like those that you find at the supermarket – try some from your local farmers market or a good quality fruit shop).

It goes like this…

You’ll need:

5-6 large field mushrooms
1 tbs olive oil
1 medium Eggplant, diced
handful of sundried tomatoes, oil drained on paper towel, roughly chopped
handful of fresh thyme (from my garden!), remove leaves from sprigs
large pinch of salt and pepper
1 yellow capsicum, diced
1 red onion, diced
1 brown onion, diced
3 rashers of bacon, diced
1 egg, whisked
1 cup of tasty shredded cheese

Method:
1.Preheat the oven to 200°C.

2. Saute the onions and bacon in a pan until soft and cooked.

3. Add the eggplant and capsicum cooking most of the way through.

4. Place ingredients in a bowl, add thyme, salt and pepper, egg and sun-dried tomatoes.

5. Mix thoroughly.

6. Remove stem of mushrooms and brush both sides of the mushrooms with oil. Bake for 10 minutes. Take out of oven and fill with the prepared stuffing.

7. Top with cheese and bake for another 10 minutes. Serve whilst warm with salad! (Yes, I did run out of cherry tomatoes so the salad was a little sweeter than usual but still delicious). Salad served with apple cider vinegar.

Om nom nom and so healthy.