Nutrition
| Per 100 g | Per 1 oz (28 g) | |
|---|---|---|
| Energy | 647 kcal | 183 kcal |
| Protein | 10.9 g | 3.1 g |
| Fat | 66 g | 18.7 g |
| saturated | 8.3 g | 2.3 g |
| Carbohydrate | 6.1 g | 1.7 g |
| sugars | 3.2 g | 0.9 g |
| Fibre | 4.3 g | 1.2 g |
| Sodium | 321 mg | 91 mg |
Estimated from the ingredients, for the finished dried product. Actual values vary with the produce you use and how far you dry it.
Ingredients
- 980 grams button mushrooms (about 49 medium), washed, stemmed
For Stuffing
- 3 1/2 cups walnuts
- 1 3/4 cups pine nuts
- 1 3/4 cups olive oil
- 7 cups fresh basil
- 10 garlic cloves
- 1 3/4 teaspoons salt
Instructions
- Wipe the mushrooms with a damp cloth rather than washing them. A mushroom is a sponge, and one held under a tap takes on water it will spend hours handing back.
- Twist the stems out rather than cutting them, and keep what comes away. Twisting leaves a deep clean cavity for the stuffing, while cutting leaves a stub taking up the space.
- Sit the caps upside down and salt them lightly while you make the pesto. Salt draws water out of the gills, and what beads up on them now is water the machine does not have to remove later.
- Blend the walnuts and pine nuts before the basil joins them. Nuts need time under the blade and basil needs seconds — run them together and the basil goes black and bruised.
- Pour the olive oil in slowly with the machine running. Added all at once it splits away from the nuts and pools in the bottom of the bowl.
- Blot the cavities out, then fill each one level with the rim rather than heaping it. A heaped cap keeps a cool wet core long after the mushroom around it has finished.
- Dehydrate at 41 °C for 6 hours. This is the lowest setting in the batch because there is a great deal of olive oil in that filling, and oil run warmer separates and drains out of the cap.
- They are finished when the mushroom has shrunk and darkened and the pesto has gone from wet to matt, while the cap still yields to a squeeze. These are meant to stay tender rather than go crisp.
- Eat them the day they are made, warm off the trays. Raw garlic and fresh basil sitting in oil inside a mushroom is not a preserve — refrigerate any that are left and finish them within two days.
