Happy Holidays

With only 5 days left til Christmas, we at Desert Moon would like to say Merry Christmas and Happy New Year's! We look forward to 2013 and all the possibilities it will bring.  For your Christmas meal we encourage you to cook up and serve oyster mushrooms! We at Desert Moon, just want to give a great big shout out to all of our blog readers. Thank you for taking the time to read our blog posts! Share our blog with others, so they may know the goodness of oyster mushrooms as well!

As always, here is nice oyster mushroom recipe that can be served as an appetizer on Christmas Day! Enjoy!

Oyster Mushroom Chowder
    4 tablespoons butter
    1/2 pound oyster mushrooms, coarsely chopped
    1/2 cup minced onions
    1 cup cubed peeled potatoes
    2 cups milk, scalded
    Salt and pepper to taste
    Dash of ground mace or ground all spice
    Dash of Tabasco sauce
    Pinch of dried thyme
    2 egg yolks
    1/4 cup vegetable stock
    1 cup half and half
    Bread cubes browned in butter and drained well
    Minced fresh parsley
 
Directions:
Melt 2 tablespoons of the butter in a large saucepan. Add the mushrooms and onions, and cook for 3 minutes or until tender. Remove with a slotted spoon and keep warm. Add the remaining 2 tablespoons butter to the pan and slowly cook the potato cubes for 10 minutes or until tender. Gradually stir in the milk. Add the salt, pepper, mace or all spice, Tabasco, and thyme. Allow this to come to a boil, then remove the pan from the heat. In a mixing bowl, combine the egg yolks, vegetable stock, and half and half and slowly blend the mixture into the chowder. Add the onions and mushrooms and heat almost, but not quite, to a boil. Taste to correct the flavoring. Serve at once in soup plates. Float the bread cubes in the soup and sprinkle with parsley.