Written by: Roscoe |  Print this post and share it with your buddies!

Ingredients:

12-14 good sized button mushrooms

Remove stems and scoop center, chop, then mix with…

Stuffing, Take Your Pick:

Chop fine and saute’ in olive oil:

bacon – a few slices

onion – 1/4-1/2

red pepper – 1/4 – 1/2

sun dried tomatoes – 2-3

artichoke hearts- 2-3

kielbasa, ham, pastrami, salami, corned beef… (you get the picture)

bread crumbs

cheese

Okay, we know veggies are good for us, and we’re supposed to eat about a thousand servings of them a day so we can grow up to be strong and healthy. But let’s face it, now that we belong to Club Roscoe, we’re probably not gonna grow any more, except maybe sideways, and even a can of spinach a day won’t make us much stronger. And what does all this mean?

We Eat Food Cause it Tastes Good

Now the mushroom – actually a fungus, and one of the only foods with natural vitamin D – has never been among the top foods in raw flavor. Cave men used the big ones for soccer balls until one of ‘em fell into a fire (they had fire then). And since they hadn’t invented the insulated BBQ glove yet, it took the guy a while to get it out, so it had time to cook.

He was probably about to throw the thing back onto the playing field when he realized it smelled pretty good. And since cave guys probably didn’t sit down to regular meals (more squatting on the ground than sitting at the table), he might have given in to his base instincts and just took a bite out of that mushroom. And that’s the day the world changed for cave men (the wheel came a little later).

Gotta Cook ‘Em

Sliced and sauteed in olive oil, Worcestershire, Cholula and wine is probably the best way to bring out the flavor in a mushroom. But broiled is good, as is roasted. Even baked.

Stuffed is Best

Not only do you get the flavor of the mushroom, but you can add all kinds of other good stuff to it. Onions and garlic and bacon and cheese and salami or pastrami or corned beef or ham or just about anything else you can think of. Almost everything goes pretty well in a mushroom.

Here’s How You Do It:

Clean your mushrooms (they come out of the ground, remember). Then scoop out the stem and the center. Chop that all up with whatever else you want to put in your stuffed mushrooms. The Club Roscoe test kitchens have found a few good combinations:

Pastrami, Swiss cheese, onion and garlic.

Bacon, garlic, green onion and olive (green or black, whichever you like).

Ham, red pepper, artichoke hearts, feta cheese.

Kielbasa (of course).

Or any combination that sounds good.

Chop it all up real fine, saute’ it in olive oil, season it, then mix it with breadcrumbs until it starts to stick together.

Scoop this mixture into the mushroom cavity, then cover with you favorite cheese. Roscoe recommends Fontinella or Gouda or smoked cheddar.

Place the mushrooms on a baking sheet, put ‘em in the oven at 350, and let ‘em cook till the cheese melts and they start to brown, probably about 20 minutes.

The Hidden Benefits

There’s another reason the cave guys kept eating those mushrooms, only they didn’t really realize it. Mushrooms are chock full of B vitamins, which gave them energy, and selenium, which is good for fertility.

After cave men discovered mushrooms, cave babes never had a chance.