Porcini Mushrooms

I consider quite some food as highly overrated if you compare what you pay and what you get. Among these Truffles and Porcini mushrooms. Whereas I still keep my opinion about truffles (so often disappointing!), this season I changed my mind about Porcinis.  It is also a quality issue. This season  I could get high quality porcini for less than 25€/kg. High quality means, you get a well proportioned mushroom, which is immaculate white inside. Often already they are attacked by maggots, which does not necessarily reduce taste, but ver much usability.  If there are of good quality, they are worth their cost compared to other food.

My first dish you can do only if they are completely sane and imaculate.  Carpaccio of porcini. Cut them raw into thin slices, arrange them on a plate and treat them with the best olive oil you have in the kitchen, some grains of salt.

A similar uninvasive treatment ist to cut them into halves and panfry them. Best Olive Oil, maybe a bit of salt and parsil. This is a second course dish by  itself or a luxory side dish to something that should be equally luxury. I.e  a steak or a fillet from Chianino beef.

A classical Italian dish is pasta with Porcini. I produced special Pici from rye flower and it was worth the effort. As you are already contaminating the  porcini wiht pasta, you can also go further.  I sliced the stems of     porcini, of which I  had pan fried the heads apart,  and panfried the stem cubes together with zucchini cubes of th e same size. A very nice pasta condiment..

You can prepare a very special omelette with the Porcini. But you really need a good antistick pan.  Cut the mushrooms into thin  slices and arrange them in the fatty pan (Butter is an option!) Fry them to goodness and verse the beaten eggs over it.  Get it cooked as omelettes are done,

In another post yesterday I wrote about Porcini and Chestnut soup , remarkable also,

...the wines