Braised Mixed Mushrooms with Wrinkled Olives and Orange
These braised mushrooms with wrinkled olives and orange take their cue from other traditional Greek recipes that call either for seafood, such as squid or octopus, or pork, cooked with oranges and olives. But there is a huge difference. Mushrooms are a kind of delicious functional food – a super food -- and they are gaining in reputation as a great replacement for red meat and a salve against Alzheimer’s. Indeed, research shows that mushroom consumption a few times a week has a beneficial effect on slowing the progress of Alzheimer’s Disease.
Mushrooms are an important component of the Greek diet. The caps are the healthiest and most beneficial part of the mushroom – and also the meatiest. You will be surprised, too, at how delicious a cooked orange, peel and all, can be! As for the olives, I like the mild flavored wrinkled black Greek throumbes, with their oily, pleasantly “leathery” texture.
Ingredients
- 1 ½ pounds mixed mushrooms oyster, shiitake, button, cepes
- ½ cup extra virgin Greek olive oil
- 1 large leek trimmed, washed and coarsely chopped
- 1 fennel bulb trimmed and chopped
- 4 garlic cloves chopped
- 1 orange preferably organic, cut into chunks with the peel on
- 1 star anise
- 10 – 12 wrinkled black Greek throumbes olives
- 2 rosemary sprigs
- 1 cup red wine
- 1 teaspoon dried Greek thyme
- Sea salt and black pepper to taste
Instructions
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Wipe the mushrooms clean with a damp kitchen towel or paper towels and cut them into large pieces if they’re too big. The oyster mushrooms and shiitakes can be rather large and may need to be cut in half to make them easier to serve and eat.
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Heat the olive oil in a wide, deep skillet and cook the leeks and fennel over medium heat until soft, about 8 minutes. Stir in the garlic.
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Add the mushrooms, star anise, and rosemary. Season with a little salt and cook until the mushrooms lose a little volume. Squeeze the juice out of the orange pieces into the pan and add the pieces to the mushrooms as well.
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Add the wine and cover. Cook over medium heat until the mushrooms are tender. Stir in the olives and thyme, season with a little sea salt and black pepper to taste and cook for a few more minutes, covered, for the flavors to meld. Serve hot or at room temperature.
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