I really, REALLY wanted to make a wild mushroom sauce for some pasta I had just made, but my favorite store, somehow, was out of wild mushrooms.
AND... they were also out of dried wild mushrooms...
What's a hungry mycology-mad cook to do???
I bought a pound of plain white buttons... wiped them clean, quartered them, and sautéed them in EVOO in a very hot pan until golden brown. I bought some shiitakes as well, cleaned them, stemmed them (save the stems for stock), sliced them and sautéed them.
Now comes the magic: I remembered that hidden in the back of a cupboard, I had an ounce of dried mixed wild mushrooms!!! I soaked them in very hot water, lifted the mushrooms out, and drained the soaking liquid through a coffee filter to trap any dirt or sand. I sautéed a bit of garlic and shallot, added the various mushrooms, splashed in a bit of port, then added the mushroom soaking liquid and reduced it a bit, and then added a splash of a stock I'd made from duck trimmings. (More on this soon!)
A drop or two of cream... some perfectly cooked homemade wide pasta... a shower of Parmesan...
Mushroom Heaven.