Baked Mushrooms in Foil Packets

There is no need for any other recipe. This is everything.

Get foil. Put mushrooms (today: oyster, shiitake, cremini). Sprinkle with staples. Glob with garlic. Crimp it up good, maybe double wrap. Whack it inna the oven and…wait for it…bread, salad, ok, poke a wee – ! – ! – ! – WHAMMO! Holy cloud of umami, sweet-scented succulence, I’m on the ceiling with the funky-funghi-fug oh WOW AM I HUNGRY what-have-I-done-here THIS IS THE BEST FOOD THAT EVER FOODED.

Ahem. My writing days may be over, but perhaps you’ll make this recipe, and once we peel YOU from the ceiling, and we’re all in agreement that all is not lost in this world that gives us mushrooms, you’ll stand up to clean the dishes and WELL I NEVER SCRUBBED A POT SO FAST IN MY LIFE as this foil ball I just hole-in-oned, DINNER IS DONE and I’ve got time to learn crochet AND watch the entire Golden Girls library AND ALSO count the change in the couch cushions…AND I’ll need some new hobbies cause they’ll never let me write a recipe review again.

I used 8 1/2 ounces and it was gobbled up as a side among 2 of us. So 7 ounces would have been skimpy.

Mushroom varieties were king oyster, shiitake, cremini. (I LOVED the king oyster, sold in cellophane packs with the Asian veggies. The stems, sliced into coins, tasted like scallops.)

Soy was regular, it was a bit on the salty side, could hold back a bit on that.

Foil did leak a tad so thank goodness I put it on a baking sheet. Next time I’ll just double-wrap.

Tender, juicy, no matter the size/shape/texture of mushroom. Universally lovable. I think the oven temp and timing could be virtually anything. Packet stayed hot on the table for 10 minutes, too. Very forgiving.

We GOBBLED this up, I had a baked potato, he forked pieces alongside a burger. Juices were great for spooning and dipping. Any side would work—bread, rice, ramen, egg noodles.

This recipe really was awesome.

This recipe exemplifies the idea of taking a good product and letting it shine. Mushrooms truly run the gamut when it comes to flavors, especially with wild and exotic varieties where the flavor is more delicate. This recipe works because the ingredients called for really help to enhance the mushroom flavor. Even better, it can be made with ingredients typically on hand and requires very little time to put together. It’s a great base recipe to experiment with different types of mushrooms.

I used shiitake mushrooms, low sodium soy sauce, and Shaoxing wine. The mushrooms were enough to serve 2 as a side or 1 as a main. I served this with quinoa.

Don’t let not being able to source mixed Japanese mushrooms keep you from experiencing the joy of this recipe. This is a perfect way to take those basic white mushrooms you find at nearly any supermarket and make them taste incredible.

I used button mushrooms, quartered them, and out of possible concern the white mushrooms might not have enough flavor, added sliced green onion and ginger. Those little mushrooms proved me wrong, providing flavor in spades. The smell of the steam when the parcel was opened brought people to the table faster than any dinner bell could, and we used spoons to make sure none of the broth that remains in the foil goes to waste. It goes perfectly over freshly steamed rice…a real winner.

As it has been very warm, I opted for something simple that was not going to heat up the kitchen. My local farmers market has an amazing mushroom vendor who sells a mushroom medley of shiitake, wood ear, oyster, and assorted other fungi. I have grilled and roasted these before, so I knew it was the perfect candidate for this recipe. It was very easy to prepare. The recipe calls for the big reveal to be done at the table. Nothing prepared me for the fragrant garlic smell wafting when the foil pouch was opened. The taste was even more spectacular. Delicate and strong all in one.

I used low-sodium soy sauce and shiitake, wood ear, and oyster mushrooms. I think the shiitake mushrooms really benefited from the marinade. The mushrooms were soft and tender. A really great way to serve mushrooms. I would consider doing with just shiitakes because the blending of flavors between those mushrooms and the sauce was superior to the others.

It served two people comfortably. There were some leftovers. I served it with salmon glazed with hoisin sauce and brown sugar and roasted Brussels sprouts. I think this was would be amazing mixed with steamed rice.

This is going to be a regular fixture in my dinner rotation.

Just reading the recipe made my senses tingle. These mushrooms were tender and unctuous. The garlicky sauce created just enough dipping sauce to dance them around with chopsticks.

I baked 2 parcels, one with a layer of parchment inside the foil (I don’t usually use foil alone for serving out of) and a second one with just foil. The one with the parchment had a bit less concentrated liquid probably from allowing more juice to come out of the mushrooms. Next time I’ll increase the oven temp to 450°F to accommodate for this. The recipe as written worked great, though.

Added a bit more of fresh parsley before serving. Had one parcel as a starter for 3 served with a shot of cold Tyku sake. Served the mushrooms from the second parcel tossed on broiled steak with extra sauce on the side. Both were perfect! My daughter, who can’t eat with chopsticks, requested them and speared a few mushrooms easily plus some of the smaller pieces just adhered easily to the end of the chopstick, giving the impression of successful chopstick use! Will definitely make this again!

I used enoki, black maitake, oyster, shiitake, and eringi (1 exotic pack plus 1 pack maitake). Serves 2 as a side or 1 as a main or 3 as a starter.

The world is divided in two by mushroom lovers and the opposite, and I’m on the lovers side, with one more good reason here fueling that passion. This would be good with any kind of mushroom, including plain old button mushrooms, I’m sure, since I had to use a few to augment the exotics I could get a hold of. For those, which were bigger than the others, I cut them either in half or in quarters. I was concerned those bigger pieces wouldn’t become tender, but that was an unfounded concern: the 20-minute bake time was perfect.

But before I had that concern, I was initially concerned about the quantity of sauce vs the quantity of mushrooms, and I need not have been concerned about that, either. Though it looked skimpy going into the oven, upon opening the parcels, there was plenty of liquid inside, much more than appears in the photo, and so much so that I recommend planning a use for it. That use could be as simple as mopping it up with bread, either fresh or lightly toasted. As it was, I served this with Japanese noodles and I just dumped the delicious liquid atop the noodles.

For mushroom lovers, the serves 1 vs serves 2 question is clear: this serves 1! However, it could serve 2, and, if planning to serve 2, I would recommend making two separate parcels, so each diner gets their own parcel, since that is part of the charm of this recipe.

I prepared my parcels carefully, like origami, and, as I did so, I wished I had used heavy duty foil. One of my parcels had some leakage while baking and this reaffirmed the idea of using the sturdier foil option. Upon opening the packet, the mushrooms were fragrant, the garlic was also tender, and the possibilities of what to serve with them expanded. They would be excellent alongside ramen or miso soup, lovely with some kind of spinach or greens or a simple sea vegetable salad, adjacent to edamame, with tofu, alongside a rice dish in lieu of the noodles I used, or speared as an appetizer presentation. Making these parcels reminded me of the Steamed Vegetables in Parchment. Despite the very different technique, the vegetables-as-gift nature of each of these adds a charming element to a simple vegetable dish and predisposes a diner to joy and happiness with the vegetables inside, in the same way a nicely wrapped holiday or birthday gift predisposes to enjoying the gift on the inside.

We really enjoyed this little parcel as an appetizer but I would imagine that they would make a great side dish as well. They are a cinch to prepare and are ready quickly enough that they can be whipped up when a salty, snacky desire strikes.

I get a weekly mushroom order from a local organic farm that specializes in gourmet mushrooms and, last week, I received a mixture of lion’s mane, enoki, black oyster, and chestnut. I was so thrilled to see a test recipe that I could try out.

I sliced up 7 ounces of various mushrooms and used low-sodium soy sauce and Shaoxing cooking wine.

After cooking the parcel for the time suggested, the only thing I might recommend is perhaps adding the enoki mushrooms halfway through as we prefer them to still have that little snap. If you like them all to be the same tenderness, however, add them at the beginning and don’t worry as the timing and temperature given are perfect.

This is a super easy way to prepare some delicious mushrooms and it opens up a lot of possibilities. The mushrooms cook beautifully in the foil and become self-saucing. I used fresh shiitake and maitake mushrooms, simply because those were what was available on my weekly trek to a store. They worked great, but I think almost any mushroom would take well to this treatment. The flavors aren’t particularly Japanese, so you could play around with different mushrooms and tweak the seasoning a bit and this could be French, or Italian, or Spanish, or whatever. I served these as part of a Japanese meal one evening, and the next served the leftovers as a pizza topping, and they were delicious in both settings.

The mushrooms were fresh shiitake and maitake. I used GF tamari and the wine was sake. This served two as a side with some left over that we used for a pizza. I would say we got 3 servings out of it.

With some shiitakes on hand from our weekly CSA box, I thought I would give this recipe for steamed mushrooms a whirl. This simple recipe was impressive and came together in no time at all.

As for the recipe itself, I used low-sodium soy sauce, shiitake mushrooms, and a dry white wine (a Pinot Grigio). I actually doubled the recipe and this made enough for 2 people as a generous side dish; so the stated recipe would feed 1 person nicely as a side dish. After 20 minutes cooking time the mushrooms were tender and perfectly cooked. And, as expected, very fragrant with the combination of ingredients!

I liked the use of foil here instead of a traditional parchment parcel like you see when cooking “en papillote” as it was easier to close the parcels fully without worrying that they might open while in the oven.

I served the fragrant mushroom parcels with a soy and maple-marinated salmon and some sauteed spicy bok choy over black rice.