Perhaps it says something about my continued stubbornness when it comes to table manners, but finger food is my favorite type of food.
I remember at family holiday parties my tendency to find the door that all the cater waiters come out of and post-up right outside of it. I’ve been known to embrace similar tactics in adulthood, especially at weddings, when come cocktail hour I’m hangry enough to pounce headfirst into a tray of crab cakes.
But now that I’m gluten-free and try to eat a more balanced diet, there are fewer trays that I’m able to attack. Last holiday season, I found this to be an incredibly depressing reality of my new finger food loving existence. But it isn’t necessarily a bad thing, so long as you’re the one designing what goes out that swinging kitchen door.
After all, while standing outside the catering tent at weddings is great as a special occasion practice, when you have a flurry of holiday parties in one week, as can happen this time of year, doing so at every single one might cause you to require a triple bypass before the age of 30. It’s a marathon not a sprint, people.
Since Thanksgiving gluttony leads straight into this period of merriment, and said merriment usually involves oodles of carbs and calories, I thought I’d take it upon myself to design two recipes for President Cheese that won’t leave you wishing your reindeer sweater came in a slightly chunkier cable knit.
First up, is a spin on stuffed mushroom caps. Instead of the usual creamy spinach dip filling with mayo and cream cheese, I did a faux creamed kale by sautéing the greens with a little Président® Unsalted Butter and mixing them together with pureed white beans. The caps are topped with a light dusting of Président® Manchego cheese, which produces a decadent brown crust.
If you’d like to enter to win $50 worth of your own Président cheese, visit ArtOfCheese.com, where you can download a coupon and enter the Pinterest sweepstakes, plus find more holiday recipes and product information.
In the meantime, these healthy stuffed mushrooms would make for the perfect gluten-free Thanksgiving appetizer or main course, if you went with a portobello cap.
Eat up!
xo
Phoebe
Stuffed Mushrooms with “Creamed” Kale and Manchego
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon unsalted butter or olive oil
- 1 large shallot thinly sliced
- 1 large garlic clove minced
- ¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes
- 1 teaspoon salt divided
- 2 cups frozen kale
- ¼ cup white wine
- One 15-ounce can cannellini beans rinsed and drained
- Olive oil
- 1 pound cremini mushrooms about 20, brushed with a damp towel and stems removed
- 1/2 cup grated President Manchego cheese
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 375ºF.
- Heat the butter in a large nonstick skillet. Sauté the shallot over medium heat until soft, 3 minutes. Add the garlic, red pepper and ½ teaspoon salt and cook one more minute. Fold in the kale and cook, stirring occasionally, until the kale has softened and released its liquid, 4 minutes. Add the white wine and simmer until evaporated, 1 minute. Set aside.
- Meanwhile, in a small food processor, puree the beans with ½ teaspoon salt, 1 tablespoon of olive oil and ¼ cup of water until smooth. Fold the white bean puree into the kale mixture and stir to combine.
- Arrange the mushroom caps on a parchment lined baking sheet and brush the outside of the caps lightly with olive oil. Scoop a large spoonful of the kale mixture into the cavity of each cap. Top with the cheese.
- Bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes or until the mushrooms are tender and the cheese has begun to brown.
- Serve warm or at room temperature
Notes
Nutrition
Sponsorship: Lactalis compensated me for this post and provided me with complimentary Président cheese products. As always, all claims and opinions are my own.
I love President butter. Never tried their cheese.
Love the butter!
Miam !
what an awesome idea!
I love everything about your website! Keep on inspiring girl. I’m starting to look into more of these recipes for my husband and I. Really random but I’m starting to realize a good processor can come in handy especially for this recipe. If you don’t mind me asking what kind of food processor do you use? Thanks!
That means so much Keani! Thank you for reading and for taking the time to comment. Believe it or not, I use a very simple 4-cup Cuisinart Mini Prep Processor for most of my cooking. It is only $40 and small enough to live on the counter. I rarely pull out my big processor – only for catering jobs back when I was doing huge quantities. My mini one can handle most things! Hope this helps!
These were delicious! I just added some panko bread crumbs and some more butter to the kale mixture before stuffing the mushrooms and then sprayed them with olive oil, but everything else was exactly the same. I also waited until the last few minutes of baking before adding the shredded Manchego. I will definitely be making these again–thank you for the recipe!
That’s so great to hear Lisa!! I’ll have to try with some GF panko this holiday season 🙂 Thank you for making and reporting back!
These were great! A nice appetizer for Thanksgiving. Made some extra to freeze for a light weeknight dinner. Will definitely make again.
I’m so glad Luciana!! I love this recipe, and you can definitely make it using portobellos for a weeknight main course. xo