Hooray for Hors d’ourves: Pickled Mushrooms

Another one!

This recipe is from The Smirnoff Brunch Book (1971). I first saw this book when it was featured on YesterdaysMenus.com I commented on how much I enjoyed the photos and recipes form the cookbook, and I was so surprised when the owner of the site, Heather, said she’d send it to me so I could start making some of the recipes!

It’s a very fun cookbook because all of the menus are for brunch, and every single brunch features a Smirnoff cocktail (or punch). One day I’d love to just make a full brunch, from A to Z, but in the meantime I just picked a couple of dishes from the “BEFORE THE GAME” chapter to take to a game-watch party hosted by my friends Emily & Sean. The game was the Baltimore Ravens vs. the New England Patriots.

I believe that I have given my opinion on both of these teams multiple times on this blog, so it’s no surprise I couldn’t root for either team. This was the Sophie’s Choice of NFL match-ups. But a good party trumps any football allegiances, amiright?

The first dish on the docket: Pickled Mushrooms.

These were featured in the “Hint of Autumn” brunch:

The days are getting hazy. Here and there a leaf is beginning to turn and at night there’s a definite chill in the air. But you really know it’s autumn because next Saturday the first pro football game will be on TV…

OK, well, it wasn’t autumn. It’s the playoffs for fuck’s sake, but football season is football season. And, I gave Sean a handful of dishes from this cookbook to choose from for the party and this was one of them.

Pickled Mushrooms

• 1 large onion, minced
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 2 cups dry white wine
• 1/2 cup cider vinegar
• 2 bay leaves
• 1/2 tsp thyme 1/2 tsp pepper
• 1/2/ tsp salt
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 1 1/2 pounds button mushrooms
• snipped chives

Combine first 8 ingredients in a saucepan. Bring to a boil and simmer for 5 minutes. Add oil. Wash mushrooms and pat dry. Remove stems. Put caps in wine-vinegar-oil mixture. Simmer until mushrooms are barley tender (8 to 10 minutes). Refrigerate until ready to serve. Sprinkle with chives. Serve with toothpicks for spearing.

OK, so here’s the issue–I confused the Ravens game the week before with the game that was this particular day. The week before, kick-off was at 8. This game started at 4:30. I didn’t start making these until 2.

I thought I had so many more hours!!!

So I went through all of the steps, but the mushrooms were still a bit warm when I arrived to the game-watch. So they sat in the fridge for the first half of the game and were served later than most of the goodies. They definitely weren’t perfect–an overnight pickle would have been optimal, but they were still good.

Here is the resulting party spread. the pickled mushrooms are in the Early American patterned Pyrex dish to the right of the big, metal bowl filled with pretzel chips.

Yes, that is a Flacco jersey gracing the table. And I think that is a Ravens-themed David the Gnome.

Yeah, I overlook a lot of things while living here in Baltimore.