Mushroom Gratin with Eggs & Parmesan

From Coles Magazine, August 2013.

How often do you purchase goods for one particular dish and then, through circumstances, don’t use them? Every so often I find myself with ingredients and need to go searching for a recipe to use them up. I had mushrooms and found this recipe to use them.

I took a large frying pan and heated up some olive oil. Into it went a mixture of mushrooms cut into slices. They were sautéed for about 10 minutes. I then added a chopped onion and continued the cooking for another 3 minutes. Next into the pan went  2 chopped garlic cloves and a couple of sprigs of fresh thyme. After 2 more minutes I added a couple of dashes of red wine vinegar and cooked it further until this had evaporated. Now I stirred in two large tablespoons mascarpone (the recipe called for cream) and about a dessertspoon butter. Once these had been fully incorporated into the mushrooms the mixture was tipped into a casserole dish.

In a separate bowl 2 eggs were beaten with about ½ cup grated parmesan cheese and a lot of chopped parsley. This mixture was poured over the mushrooms and they went into a 200ºC oven until cooked. It took about 10 minutes.

If you have the mushrooms and you enjoy them, then this dish should please. It’s a useful way to use up mushrooms though it’s not anything spectacular. It makes a good middle-of-the-week-and-you-can’t-think-of-anything-to-make dish. With some greens and a heap of mashed potato it will go down well.

Taste: ✔✔✔

Ease of cooking: ✔✔✔✔