Friday, October 14, 2011

Go Pink with Sundried Tomato and Cream Cheese-Stuffed Mushrooms

This recipe content is proudly sponsored by the Australian Mushroom Growers Association, who compensated me for creating the recipe and kindly supplied fresh produce to cook it with.



Did you know that in Australia, 2680 women die from breast cancer each year?

And that it is the most common invasive cancer in women after non-melanoma skin cancer?

They're our boobs. And they can kill us.

This year, Australia's Mushroom Growers are throwing their support behind the fight against breast cancer with the Mushrooms Go Pink campaign.

You may have already seen mushrooms in your local supermarket dressed for the occasion in pretty pink packaging - their new outfit aims to promote Breast Cancer Awareness Month, leading into the Cancer Council's Pink Ribbon Day on Monday, October 24.

If you want to show your support for the campaign, go along and buy some pink packaged mushrooms and then come home and make something scrumptious... like these stuffed mushrooms *ahem*. For every kilo of fresh mushrooms sold in the pink packages during October, a contribution will be made to the Cancer Council with the aim of raising $50,000.

I've made stuffed mushrooms today, but I asked whoever was hanging out on Facebook recently what their favourite dishes were - so if you need some inspiration, you can try:

stuffed with garlic and breadcrumbs 
carbonara 
fried like a burger with provolone and pesto 
risotto 
stuffed with basil pesto 
mushroom gravy 
sliced with capsicum in fajitas 
stuffed with camembert 
mushroom steaks 
crumbed and served with aioli 
plain old fried with butter 

And in addition to mushrooms being delicious, they also contain more than 20% of B vitamins, are a good source of vitamin B12 (excellent for vegans), the only non-animal food to contain vitamin D, low kj and are an excellent superfood. Given that the Cancer Council promotes a healthy diet in combating cancer, it makes perfect sense for that diet to contain such nutrient powerhouses.

Top them with sundried tomato cream cheese and you've hit the jackpot!


Sundried Tomato and Cream Cheese Stuffed Mushrooms

Ingredients
Mushrooms - either button size for canapes, or stuff big portobellas
125g sundried tomatoes
1 cup boiling water
1/2 tub cream cheese
1 tablespoon pine nuts
a pinch of salt
Stems of mushrooms
breadcrumbs
grated parmesan

Directions
1. Put the sundried tomatoes in a small bowl and cover with the boiling water for 15 minutes to rehydrate.

2. Pre-heat your oven to 200C

3. Mix drained sundried tomatoes, cream cheese, pine nuts and salt in a food processor.

4. Fill your de-stemmed mushrooms with about a tablespoon of the mixture.

5. Place on a plate and cover with breadcrumbs and grated parmesan.

6. Transfer to a tray and collect all the little bits of cheese that missed the mushrooms the first time and pop it on top. Spray very lightly with oil.

7. Bake in oven 20-25 minutes until hot and cooked through. You might want to put them under the grill to brown on top. You don't want them totally collapsed, though.



If you'd like to see what other bloggers have come up with, check out Fig and Cherry, Limes and Lycopene, and Melanger. Or if you make something delicious, come back and tell me what you made... I love hearing about you getting busy in the kitchen!

For more nutrition information, go here.

So tell me - what's your favourite mushroom dish? 

9 comments:

  1. Ohhh these look delicious, I can't wait to try them!!

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  2. Great creation. 
    I wish I could hire you as my chef once a month (actually once a week, but I would be happy with once a month).

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  3. haha as much as I love cooking, I still desperately want my own personal chef!

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  4. Another great recipe, also thought you might like to see this:
    http://www.writeaboutme.com.au/HomebrsmallWelcomesmall/tabid/253/EntryId/26/Guest-Blogger-Who-is-Veggie-Mama.aspx

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  5. Love this combo Veggie Mama! Thank you so much for creating such a yummy and easy mushie recipe to support Mushrooms Go Pink. I'm sure many of your readers will be itching to give them a go - I certainly am :)

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  6. Mmmmmm delicious! I love mushrooms but have never attempted a stuffed mushroom myself. It's defiitely happening now!

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  7. Stuffed with garlic butter and breadcrumbs is pretty amazing too!

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