Mushroom Steel Cut Oat "Risotto"

Last summer I ended up with a box of steel cut oats, and no idea whatsoever to do with them. The internet is your friend, of course, so I searched out a bunch of recipes. Once I wrapped my head around the fact that oatmeal neither had to be breakfast food nor had to be sweet, a whole new world opened up for me. This was also during my baby bella mushroom obsession, so it pretty much demanded I try it.

This recipe (which comes from Foxes Love Lemons) was not exactly what I was hoping for, but it wasn't a bad way to fix steel cut oats. I'll make it again, although with some tweaking.

The ingredients are very simple, and easy enough to find. Steel cut oats, chicken broth, white wine, mushrooms, Parmesan cheese (it probably would have been better with real Parmesan, but you work with what you've got), leek, garlic, rubbed sage, and fresh thyme. The thyme came from my herb garden, the leek from the farmer's market, and everything else from the grocery store.

First step is to heat the chicken broth in a pan, which apparently I chose not to take a picture of. Then you slice the leek into rings and saute it in some butter. The directions say to cook it 2 minutes, but I wasn't paying attention and it ended up being more like 5 minutes.

You then add the sliced mushrooms, garlic, and herbs and continue cooking, stirring fairly frequently, until the mushrooms are getting browned. 

Add the wine, and continue cooking for just a minute. At this point, reduce the heat from medium-high to medium-low.

Stir in the oats, and cook for a couple of minutes, stirring constantly. Then add a couple of ladles full of the hot chicken broth and cook until the liquid is gone. Keep doing that for 25 or so minutes until all the broth has been used.

Supposedly, all the broth will be absorbed into the oats. Mine did not, as you can see. I'm not sure if that's because of something with the particular kind of oats I had, or because I used baby bellas (which have a pretty high water content) or what, but I never achieved the thickness shown in the pictures on the original recipe. It was darn tasty, but there was entirely too much liquid.

To finish it off, you stir in the Parmesan cheese. The recipe also calls for garnishing with parsley and more cheese, but I don't much go for garnishes, especially when I'm just making dinner for the two of us.

SAVORY MUSHROOM AND HERB STEEL CUT OAT RISOTTO

YIELD: 4 servings

INGREDIENTS:
5-1/2 cups vegetable stock (chicken or beef stock may also be used)
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 leek (white and light green part only), halved lengthwise then cut crosswise into thin slices
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
12 ounces mushrooms (I used 8 ounces white mushrooms + 4 ounces “gourmet mushroom blend”)
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 teaspoon chopped fresh thyme leaves
1 teaspoon ground dried sage
1/4 cup dry white wine
1 cup steel cut Irish oatmeal (not the quick-cooking kind)
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese, plus extra for garnish
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley, for garnish

I hope Foxes Love Lemons doesn't mind how my version of their recipe turned out. I'll definitely be making it again, but with a couple of changes.

Serving Size: 463 g

Calories: 284

Calories from Fat: 114

Total Fat: 12.7 g

Saturated Fat: 7.5 g

Trans Fat: 0.0 g

Cholesterol: 20 mg

Sodium: 1269 mg

Total Carbohydrates: 35.5 g

Dietary Fiber: 5.9 g

Sugars: 4.9 g

Protein: 11.7 g