Mushrooms, garlic and bread – is a classic combination that I felt the need to revamp! Usually, the warm, comforting garlic infused mushrooms with melted oozing cheese is what really touches the soul on cool nights, stressful days and even the odd hangover breakfast. But this time, I wanted to shake things up.
The past few months, I’ve been working on a project that involves Piri Piri seasoning – a blend I normally don’t reach out to. My interaction was limited to the McDonald’s fries, which, honestly, just leaves me with burning lips. But with this project, I’ve been experimenting and spending a lot of time with it. So, an authentic Piri Piri seasoning bottle sat on my kitchen counter, staring at me, daring me, ‘go ahead, use me for your personal meal’. I thought, why not – right at the moment I decided to make a mushroom toast to eat in bed – and added a hefty spoonful into the mushrooms.
To contrast the softer mushrooms – I wanted some crunch factor – so I made the extra effort to fry some sliced garlic to garnish (and I felt pretty proud of myself)! After everything was ready, I became doubtful of the spice factor and found a tub of mascarpone to smear on the bread slices. Not only did this hold the mushrooms nicely, but also mellowed out the heaping spoon of piri piri.
You can easily substitute the mascarpone with cream cheese, hung curd, ricotta or even mayonnaise. If you don’t have piri piri, go for any smokey spice blend, or smoked paprika with red chilli flakes.
Side note: this pairs beautifully with a glass of white wine!
The Recipe
Serves Serves: 2 | Prep Time: 30 mins | Cook Time: 15 mins
Ingredients
- 1 tsp vegetable oil
- 100g mushrooms, chopped
- 1 tsp mixed herbs
- 1 1/2 tsp piri piri seasoning
- 1 tsp red chili flakes
- ½ tsp salt
- 4-5 cloves of garlic, sliced
- 1 tbsp mascarpone per slice of bread
- 2 slices of bread of your choice
Instructions
- Heat the 1 tsp olive oil in a pan
- Once the oil heats up, fry the garlic chips until golden and remove from the oil and place on paper napkin and set aside
- In the same pan, add the mushroom with salt and seasoning and cook on high heat for 5 minutes
- The mushrooms should be lightly cooked and not reduce too much in size – in other words, let them be juicy!
- Toast the bread slices with olive oil if you wish to and then spread mascarpone on top
- Add the mushrooms on top
- Add garlic fried chips on top
