I love mushrooms, but I haven’t had much experience with them, save for the standard, small white ones you find in the grocery store. (I realize there are other types in the store, but since I don’t enjoy cooking, I haven’t explored the use of other kinds.) My experience with mushrooms has been minimal except for pizza (overcooked), raw on salads, and overcooked ones in restaurants. However, six months ago, on a road trip, hubby and I stopped at a Cracker Barrel for lunch. On the menu were several so-called skillet meals. One of them was a chicken dish with mushrooms. I got it; it was wonderful because of the mushrooms; they were very flavorful and not overcooked. It was a simple dish – chicken chunks in a sauce (not a gravy), over white rice, with the mushrooms piled on top. (And they appeared to be the common, small white ones I’d had before, but these were so much better.) I’ve wanted to try this dish, since it’s so simple, but I don’t know what the sauce was, or whether the mushrooms were cooked, and if so, how cooked. So, please give me some info re the various types of mushrooms, their uses, and how best to prepare them so as to get the most flavor. Thanks.
Basically, a ‘gravy’ is made with drippings and a ‘sauce’ is made from something else. I’ve never been to a Cracker Barrel, so I don’t know what the sauce was; but it wouldn’t surprise me if it were started with your basic Béchamel sauce.
We get some nice-looking Chanterelle and other mushrooms up here, but I haven’t tried them.
I like to use shitake mushrooms in soups. There’s no better way to make a bowl of ramen better than to add a couple of shitakes.
Portabello mushrooms can be grilled and eaten in a sandwich, stuffed and eaten, or eaten in any number of other ways. Try this way: Make an alfredo sauce. Sauté a couple/few cloves of minced garlic in olive oil. Add one or two (depending on how much alfredo you’re making) Portabello mushrooms, sliced, and cook until tender. Add to the alfredo sauce and serve over angel hair pasta.
I like taking marinated portabello 's and grilling them with some bbq sauce, and them eating them like I would a burger.
My wife likes to scrap out the inside and then cook them in the oven like a pizza (drizzled with a little olive oil).
I’m going to go plain and simple here. I haven’t had them in a long time but I used to love fresh morel mushrooms. We would pick them, let them soak in salt water overnight(to get rid of the various unwanted lifeforms held within), and fry them for breakfast. They weren’t as good frozen, but would do in a pinch. We would try to get extra if possible to freeze for later consumption.
Looks like there are several good fried morel recipes at http://thegreatmorel.com/recipes.html.
This was in Missouri, mind you. They are mostly found from about Oklahoma northeast to Maine in the US. Some in Washington, Oregon, and northern California as well.
I like portabellos myself. They’re big and meaty and are often used as a meat substitute in vegetarian dishes. You can usually find them sliced in a grocery store, but they’re more expensive than the white button mushrooms. I like them on burgers once in a while (when I can afford them), and with steak, but you can use them in a lot of different ways:
Vegetarian Fajitas: Grill peppers, onions, and portabellos with fajita seasoning, put on a tortilla with cheese and salsa.
No meat “burger”: same as a regular burger, but cook the bellas in a frying pan with butter and use them instead of meat. Or just put them on a regular burger if you’re a meat eater, they’re pretty good.
'bellas also go great with chicken. Get some boneless skinless chicken breast tenders, cut the veins and the little bit of fat out, cook the chicken just until it’s white the whole way through. While you’re doing this, cook up some portabellos in a frying pan with butter for about 10 mins. Add to the chicken when the chicken’s almost white the whole way through. Sprinkle with cajun seasoning, which is fairly easy to find.
Seconding the portabellas with steak. I like to make my steaks in a cast iron skillet. I’ll cut one of those giant portabella caps into strips and when the steak is done and resting throw them into the skillet with the steak juices and a touch of oil and maybe a bit of onion. Saute them for a minute or two and they’re ready when the steak is. This is pretty high in the running for my favorite food ever.
They’re also good in salads, fajitas, burgers, or even just by themselves. I’m about as far as you can get from vegetarian but you can exchange my beef or chicken with portabella any day and I’ll be totally happy with it. Unfortunately they can be pricey but I think they’re worth it.
Porcini mushrooms are just awesome for stews. You can get them frozen or dried and just a few go a long way towards giving your stew some flavor. I assume some parts of the world must have access to fresh porcinis also but I’ve never seen them. Go easy on them though, especially with the dried ones, they can be pretty potent and if you go overboard they will overpower the taste of your stew.
All I can add is that recently I heated a can of Cream of Mushroom Soup and added 3 or 4 sliced mushrooms of my own to the pot. Wow! I loved it and highly recommend it as a comfort meal. (Add some cayenne pepper to it too!)
I use mushrooms all the time. I love them. I generally prefer the white button mushrooms to the portobellas.
One of my favorite recipes is basic sausage & peppers with mushrooms. First, I cook some sausage (Nature’s Promise Mild Italian Chicken Sausage if I am on a diet, regular, wonderful Italian pork sausage if I am not) and then slice it in rounds. Then I sautee sliced mushrooms, red and green bell pepper strips and onions in the sausage pan with a little olive oil. Season with salt and pepper (you can add red pepper flakes if you want some spice). While it is stilll hot, make it into a sandwich with an Italian bread and top with a little grated pecorino romano and some shredded mozzarella.
I think I have to make it tonight. 
Doody Pants*: That sounds like something I used to make., only I use Tofurkey Italian Sausage. Try adding some marinara sauce to the mix. I toast the bread and use mozzarella instead of Romano.
I haven’t made it in years (too many other things to cook!), but it’s quite tasty. I haven’t tried it with dead-animal sausage yet, but I’m sure it would be even better than the tofu.
Pop the stems, add in a little dab of butter to the centre and add a whole leaf of fresh tarragon. Grill or cook med/high heat in a non-stick frying pan. It’s done as soon as the butter melts. White, button mushrooms or portobello.
Dredge in seasoned flour and sauté in butter.
If you have large white mushrooms (like 5 or 10 cm diameter) you can stuff them. Back when I was a young adult (i.e., about 19 or 20) I made a mixture of crab, bread crumbs, minced onions, and some salt and pepper. After stuffing the mushrooms I dredged them in seasoned flour and sautéed them in butter.
Mushrooms are usually overcooked, which makes them rubbery. The mistake people usually make is to slice them. That’s fine if they’re to be cooked into a dish, but for sauteing, all one need do (for the button or crimini 'shrooms you buy at the grocery) is quarter them.
Basic sauteed mushrooms:
1 TBSP butter
2 green onions, bias sliced
1/2 pound of button mushrooms, quartered
Salt and pepper
Heat the butter in a skillet on medium heat. Add the onions, saute for a minute. Add the mushrooms and toss well. Saute for 2-3 minutes until hot through. Season with salt and pepper.
Mushrooms soak up whatever flavor happens to be around them, so if you add a splash of sherry or marsala to the above, you end up with something rather elegant, and the makings for Chicken Marsala.
I don’t care for portobello with steak, as they are very meaty-flavored on their own and compete with the steak.
Ooooh…yummy - my mouth is watering. Lots of good ideas here! (And simple recipes are what I need.) Thanks muchly.