Sausage-Stuffed Fungi

I love to throw a party, and I love to spend the entire day in the kitchen preparing for it. It's like a satisfying workout (I imagine, from what I've read); I feel accomplished when I'm done, except that I have a tangible product, rather than the hope of an awesome body sometime in the very distant future. Well, I guess that sweat is quite tangible, but it's not really the same. Anyway, it's a struggle to find a combination of recipes that keep me busy and happy all day and result in a bevy of delightful compliments, but that I don't have to spend too much time on once everyone arrives. Once the alcohol starts flowing, it's hard to remember when you put that cake in the oven; sometimes you don't remember until the smoke alarm sounds.

Sausage stuffed mushrooms fit my requirements, and I have to restrain myself not to make them for every party. In addition to the fact that they take some work, result in raving reviews, and can mostly be made ahead of time, I also love them because they seem so cruel to vegetarians. Don't get me wrong, I don't hate vegetarians (except that their continued attendance at my parties forces me to think about something other than meat, which may someday lead me to take them out with the uzi that I don't yet possess), but I feel a small measure of retribution has been eked out when you take one of their precious vegetables and stuff it full of meat. Well, a mushroom isn't really a vegetable, but almost.

Onto the recipe, adapted from epicurious. Put that uzi out of your mind, you're going to make something with lots of sausage and cheese!

The Ingredients
3 Italian hot sausages, casings removed (I've found that the hot part is crucial, though if you need to you can get regular Italian sausage and just add crushed red pepper to taste; sometimes I add more anyway)
1 1/2 teaspoons dried oregano
1 cup Parmesan cheese (about 3 ounces)
1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1 8-ounce package cream cheese, room temperature (I hate to say it, but you actually can use the lower fat neufchatel and it doesn't negatively impact the taste of the appetizer)
1 large egg yolk
Olive oil
24 large (about 2-inch-diameter) mushrooms, stemmed (Don't you dare get those stupid white button mushrooms. I use crimini. You might be able to go more exotic than that, but at your own risk).
1/3 cup dry white wine

The Work

Clean the mushrooms. Remember, they live in .... nasty dirty excrement. I learned from the Barefoot Contessa that one should gently clean the mushrooms with a damp clean kitchen towel rather than running them under the tap and scrubbing them. This does work well, since otherwise the mushrooms get pretty waterlogged. But it's pretty labor-intensive. Alternatively, wash them the easy way, remove the stems, place them on a cookie sheet with the pocket facing down, and bake for about 10 minutes at 350. They'll sweat off a lot of that water. I actually recommend doing this even if you take the careful Contessa route, because some mushrooms are just wet. The first time I made these, I ended up with about half an inch of liquid after cooking the mushrooms. They still tasted fantastic, but they were pretty pissed off at me for drowning them. No point in angering your food.

Crumble the sausage and sauté with oregano in heavy large skillet over medium-high heat until sausage is cooked through and brown, breaking into small pieces with back of fork (try to get it into pretty small crumbles, you want the sausage to fill the mushroom, not the other way around), about 7 minutes. Using slotted spoon, transfer sausage mixture to large bowl and cool (I recommend a paper towel in the bowl to sop up some of the oil; these things are decadent enough without it). Mix in 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, Worcestershire sauce, and garlic powder, then cream cheese. Season filling with salt and pepper; mix in egg yolk. I also like to chop up the stems of the mushrooms (assuming you are using criminis; stalks of some other types of mushrooms are not delightful) and put them into the filling. This adds some bulk and intensifies the mushroom flavor. It also prevents the filling from being overwhelmingly rich in its cheesiness.

Brush 15x10x2-inch glass baking dish with olive oil to coat. Brush cavity of each mushroom cap with white wine (maybe my palette just isn't that sensitive, but I've forgotten the white wine step a couple of times and didn't notice any particularly ill effects on the final product; the advantage of using the wine, however, is that you have an open bottle of wine that you are forced to drink while cooking); fill with scant 1 tablespoon filling and sprinkle with some of remaining 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese. Arrange mushrooms, filling side up, in prepared dish. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Cover and chill.)

Preheat oven to 350°F. Bake uncovered until mushrooms are tender and filling is brown on top, about 25 minutes. Note that they are very, very hot. If you give them to the guests, they will not be able to resist immediately popping one in their mouths, and it will hurt. They may scream, and the neighbors will call the cops. So to save everyone some agony, don't serve them for at least 5 minutes.

OK. Don't be alarmed when they look nothing like this photo. I just started this blog, and I intend to take yummy-looking photos, but I haven't made these mushrooms since I began this. So I have no photo. I stole it from Sandra Lee, and though these are sausage stuffed mushrooms, if you look closely you can see that they have some green crap in them as well. Don't panic when your mushrooms have no green stuff, because I've chosen a recipe that replaces that with delicious cheese. Mmmmm...