Blah-Blah-Blah Helen Gurley Brown Blah-Blah-Blah

The title tells you what you really want to know. This hot mushroom sandwich from Food Editors' Favorites: Treasured Recipes was an unquestionable fail in my book of food.

First, it's not really a two-fisted sandwich, it's party food. It's an appetizer masquerading as dinner. Second, it's boring...really boring; I would prefer an appetizer to head more in the direction of an amuse-bouche, but this sandwich didn't even have a sense of humor.

It did, however, have an intriguing 1970's pedigree. The recipe is said to have been a favorite of Cosmopolitan founder Helen Gurley Brown; for all young ladies out there who don't know who she is, go read Wikipedia for a fast overview, and thank your lucky, free-wheeling stars that she wrote Sex and the Single Girl many years ago.

The recipe came from celebrated caterer Donald Bruce White who said it was one of Mrs. Brown's favorites. White is worth talking about all on his own, let along thinking about this particularly snooze-inducing appetizer. An article in New York Magazine about 1983's new, hot caterers had this to say about White:

"Donald Bruce White's loyal clients love using his Coalport dinner plates; their Park Avenue drawing rooms are grand enough to accomodate his sterling-silver rolling carving board with it shuge dome-shaped top. White's soirees - deb parties, benefits, late suppers- have a comfortable gentility, an old-money propriety, an enormous sense of style. What would he serve for a buffet supper? Lump crabmeat made with a fine julienne of orange, served with Smithfield ham and corn sticks, spinach in Maderia, and crunchy coleslaw. No hors d'oeuvre with this supper. For dessert, an orange souffle and tuiles, the crispy curved almond cookies. This supper would cost $40 per person. For a first course at a seated dinner, he suggests small mousselines of smoked salmon and heavy cramy formed into tiny eggs and arranged aorund slices of brioche, garnished with caviar." 

Regardless, the sandwich isn't too hard to fix, and I suppose wouldn't be bad for one appetizer among several others for a cocktail party if you do that kind of thing. I don't.

I minced up the mushrooms and placed them in a pan with butter and minced scallion. I cooked until all liquid had disappeared.

Minced Mushrooms

Cooked Mushrooms with Scallions and Butter

Simultaneously, I placed more butter into a pan, added all-purpose flour, and made a lovely roux in no time. I added homemade chicken stock, heavy cream, salt, pepper, nutmeg, and cayenne. That really should have been enough to make it tasty. Yeah right. It was also not enough to make it particularly photogenic.

Then the creamy mixture was combined with the mushrooms. Getting sleepy yet?

At that point I pulled out a square loaf of sourdough bread and trimmed the crust off all the way around...

and cut into slices. Thick slices. The recipe says thin, but I didn't read closely so without a doubt, these were too thick. 

Then I spread the mushroom cream sauce on the bread, another slice stacked on top, more mushroom sauce, and another slice of bread.

Even the pictures of this make me start to yawn. The sandwich went into the oven at 400 for 10 minutes and came out semi-toasty.

I really wanted to like this sandwich. I also really wanted to add roasted red pepper and arugula and something -almost anything- into the mix for zest. Even the cayenne pepper didn't intimidate my taste buds like it so often does, and I couldn't even taste the nutmeg. I can maybe see the appeal of this appetizer with thinner sliced bread; the mushroom sauce was beginning to soak the bread - think both crunchy and soft simultaneously. That was a waste of good sourdough bread; instead of make additional sandwiches, I saved the bread and used it for very tasty French Toast.

Chunky Junky Monkey, What's Your Game?

From The Recipe Vault is an ongoing, completely irregular feature of CookBook Fetish. I'll pull out a recipe card, perhaps a favorite, perhaps something new, and see what happens. This particular recipe I collected on the internet some fourteen or fifteen years ago. I have no idea where it came from as the recipe card doesn't mention an origin.

This is a great use for bananas just about ready to go bad or go to the freezer (or go to the garbage disposal,) and is a little twist on typical banana bread. You know my phobia about bananas in banana form in recipes? That doesn't extend to the taste of bananas in a recipe, so I enjoy banana bread.

Like most quick bread recipes, this goes from bowl to oven to mouth in a little over an hour. Vary the ingredients to suit your tastes and cupboard supplies as needed.

Chunky Junky Banana Bread

1/3 cup butter, creamed
1 or 2 eggs, beaten
1 to 1 1/4 cup banana pulp, mashed thoroughly
1-2 t lime juice
2/3 cup sugar
1/2 t baking soda
1/2 t baking powder
1 1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup chocolate chips
1/4 cup dried apricots, chopped

I used dark chocolate chips and dried cherries instead of milk chocolate chips and apricots.

The only instructions I've written are 350, 1 hour, greased pan. After you've made a few quick breads, that's the only instruction needed. Ideally you'll cream together the liquids, then gently add in the dry ingredients. I usually throw it all together and slap it into a prepared pan, totally ignoring all that nonsense. I still haven't noticed a difference in my baking, though I suppose if I was at a fancy-schmancy professional kitchen it might make a difference. For me, nope.

This is a lovely, dense banana bread, sure to please your family and friends. Those writer friends I've mentioned before thoroughly enjoyed the bread, too.

Relishin' RelishRelish Recipes

The final thing I cooked from my collection of recipes from the RelishRelish menu service was your basic Pumpkin Bread. This is a quick bread recipe. Frankly, I'm still daunted by the idea of using yeast in anything other than that aging yet trusty second-hand breadmaker I've got taking up space in the kitchen. The machine sells for more than a hundred dollars; I got mine for fifty at the local thrift store - and it has been worth it.
 

The only quibble I had with the Pumpkin Bread recipe was the addition of a bunch of vegetable oil. I do my best to eliminate oil from baked goods, so never add any to brownies. I just substitute a no-nonsense applesauce and go on about my business. There's no difference in taste to me. and the fat content of the final product is lower. I didn't give in to the oil temptation here, but instead used extra pumpkin. I added a bit of butter in as well; so much for that lower fat content. 

The batter consisted of flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, sugar, eggs, water, and the aforementioned pumpkin and butter. The recipe also called for chopped pecans, so into the batter they went. It looked good and tasted good, too.

Pumpkin Bread batter

I was worried, though, because you never know what will happen when you mess around with ingredients. I also had to reduce the recipe by half because it was going to make two loaves. I only have one loaf pan and didn't want to improvise any further. I poured the batter into a greased and floured loaf pan, then baked for 45 minutes in a 350 degree oven. I crossed my fingers, went on to other things, and soon smelled a fabulous aroma coming from the kitchen.

I removed the bread from the oven and administered the "toothpick" test. The toothpick did come out clean, so I figured it was done. I laid the pan on its side to cool for a bit, and walked away.

I returned about five minutes later to find the center of the loaf slowly dribbling onto the stove. Oops! Looks like it wasn't really done after all. Back into the oven it went for another 15 minutes. And when it emerged, it did look tasty. This time I stuck it a few times with a toothpick just to be sure there would be no more messes on the stove top; that is until I cook again. (There's limited mise en place here, it's more mise en mess.)

I waited as long as I could and cut off a big hunk. Then I slathered on butter, and ate it up. The pumpkin bread was fresh, still warm from the oven and the butter melted with ease. I swooned. Since then, it's been my breakfast and late afternoon snack. It's all gone, and I still want more.

Pumpkin Bread and Butter

I'll confess, I am a certified RelishRelish junkie and heartily recommend the service for anyone looking for easy, fast, fresh food with a gourmet attitude. It's affordable, and you choose what recipes you want to prepare each week. The service also provides a grocery shopping list and all recipes every week.

When I've OD'd on Relish though, I look for other recipes that are equally satisfying and simple. And it's a long, slow slog through cookbook after cookbook, recipe after recipe, only to be disappointed. On the other hand, I discover delicious food, too. Wonder what I'll be cooking next? I sure hope it's not Alinea. There's a copy around here somewhere...