Dried mushrooms should be mold-free, not rotten or burnt, light, dry to the touch, but, depending on the type, bend slightly. Dried mushrooms are very hygroscopic and should be stored in paper or cloth bags or cardboard boxes. Usually the shelf life is up to 1 year. But if you put dried mushrooms in the freezer, then they can be stored longer. Before cooking, dried mushrooms should be soaked for 1 hour in water or milk. Dried mushrooms combined with milk or cream are suitable for pasta sauce. Dried mushrooms can be used to make an excellent filling in pies or pancakes. In winter, you can cook soups and cereals with the addition of dried white or any other forest mushrooms.

Try making a pate of red beans and dried mushrooms, and you are guaranteed to get a dish that will be appropriate for a festive feast, not to mention weekdays. There are no animal fats in the pate, so it can be safely recommended to people who are

section: Vegetable pates

Dried mushroom gravy is one of the traditional dishes of the Eastern Slavs, which is prepared for Holy Evening and Generous Evening before the New Year. Mushroom sauce was served with boiled potatoes or dumplings. In modern cuisine, this sauce goes well and

Frozen mushrooms have the same feature, but they are inferior to dried mushrooms both in ease of storage and in preserving the aroma: when dried, the mushroom aroma increases, and dishes with dried mushrooms not only cause increased salivation, but are also able to knock off an appetizing smell from the feet. An additional bonus: very little dried mushrooms are required to prepare any dish due to the mushroom aroma being enhanced during drying.

So if there is not enough space for storing autumn preparations, dried mushrooms are the best option. Most often they are used to make soup, but in fact there are many recipes that include this wonderful aromatic ingredient.

The first step in preparing dishes with dried mushrooms is to choose these very mushrooms. Drying is a responsible process, mushrooms are dried in various ways, from the old-fashioned Russian oven to the newfangled dryers for vegetables and fruits. The results, accordingly, are different. Photo: Depositphotos

Therefore, when choosing dried mushrooms for the preparation of a culinary masterpiece, you should pay attention to the fact that they are dry, without wet spots, and even more so mold, there should be no burnt areas on them. In addition, dried mushrooms should be light - this confirms their "dryness" and lack of moisture.

As for the "pedigree", the best dried mushrooms at all times were porcini mushrooms. However, you can use any dried mushrooms - they, like porcini, will give a unique taste and aroma to any dish. If you dry mushrooms yourself, then pay special attention to milk mushrooms, chanterelles and mushrooms - it is not recommended to dry them, since, in addition to the aroma, they will add unpleasant bitterness to the dish. Such mushrooms are best harvested for the winter by freezing, salting (salted milk mushrooms are very good), pickling (pickled mushrooms are a real delicacy), but not by drying.

All recipes for cooking dishes that include dried mushrooms usually begin with the words: "Soak dried mushrooms in water ...". Indeed, dried mushrooms must be soaked until they swell, collect the water expelled during drying, returning to a "dry" state. Sometimes it is recommended to pour dried mushrooms with warm boiled water for 1-2 hours, sometimes with cold boiled water for 10-12 hours.

It is optimal to keep the mushrooms in the water longer, for example, pour cold water over and leave overnight to make them as soft as possible. The fact is that dried mushrooms are harsh and that is why they need a fairly long soaking.
Photo: Depositphotos

After the soaking is over and the dried mushrooms have gained the required amount of moisture, they can be used in the same way as fresh mushrooms - boil, fry, and so on.

• For example, dried mushrooms fried with onions can be added to crumbly buckwheat porridge, resulting in a wonderful porridge with mushrooms.

• Boiled dried mushrooms can be added to borscht or cabbage soup, or you can prepare a great mushroom soup with them (a few potatoes, carrots, onions, herbs, dried mushrooms, a little pearl barley, serve with sour cream, before serving, you can decorate with parsley and / or finely chopped dill) ...

Buckwheat porridge with dried mushrooms, borscht, cabbage soup and potato and / or potato-pearl barley soup with dried mushrooms are a culinary classic that almost every housewife knows. Less commonly, dried mushrooms are used to prepare dishes such as cutlets.

• In this case, they can be used both for the filling (mushrooms fried with onions are put into the minced meat, a kind of meat "pie" with the mushroom filling is formed), or simply mix into the minced meat, again having previously fried with onions.

• Mushrooms can also be used in the preparation of chops: when frying the chop, pre-fried mushrooms with onions are laid out on the meat, sprinkled with grated cheese, if desired, you can add a little sour cream or mayonnaise.

Dried mushrooms can be used in cooking dishes such as pasta casserole... Boiled pasta is laid out in a layer in a baking dish, on top - mushrooms fried with onions, then another layer of pasta. Eggs beaten with milk are poured into a mold, the whole structure is sprinkled with grated cheese on top and placed in a preheated oven for 20-25 minutes at a temperature of 180 ° C.
Photo: Depositphotos

Dried mushrooms are also used in cooking pizza... In this case, it is recommended to pre-soak them not in water, but in milk, then fry with onions. Mushrooms are laid out on the base, complete with sauce, meat, sausage and so on - here, as the imagination and tastes of the culinary specialist allow.

Pre-soaked, fried or boiled dried mushrooms can be used in the preparation of various salads, and sandwiches- both baked and regular.

The only drawback of dried mushrooms is their hardness, which still remains, no matter how you soak them, in milk or in water. True, the bright aroma of dried mushrooms makes you forget about the flaws in taste. The only way to keep the plus of dried mushrooms and get rid of the minus is to use mushroom powder... To do this, dried mushrooms are simply crushed using a coffee grinder. The powder can be stored in a glass jar, or you can prepare the required portion every time.

In this form, dried mushrooms can be used to prepare various sauces - the wonderful aroma is preserved even after grinding, and you can literally add a pinch of mushroom powder to the sauce - this is quite enough. Mushroom powder is also great for making pureed soups. It can also be used to make pancakes by adding a little powder to the dough. Buckwheat pancakes with mushroom powder are especially good.

The presence of dried mushrooms in the home provides a culinary variety of breakfasts, lunches and dinners, allowing you to add a sophisticated festive flavor to familiar and traditional dishes. So - try, cook, enjoy!

With the onset of the autumn period for collecting forest gifts, many people go on a "quiet hunt". Mushrooms are harvested in different ways: they are salted, pickled, frozen. But, perhaps, the most popular way to harvest mushrooms is to dry them. In the cold winter time, it will be pleasant to pamper yourself with wonderful dishes made from dried fruits of the forest. Well, porcini mushrooms are considered the best, and in absolutely any condition. Mushroom pickers who are fortunate enough to collect a sufficient amount of boletus know well how to cook dried porcini mushrooms.

"The king of mushrooms" - this is how the porcini mushroom is often called, which has a tubular structure and an unusually strong, incomparable aroma, acquired after drying. And in terms of its taste, the white mushroom is considered the most valuable among the variety of forest gifts. Freshly cut porcini mushroom does not have any bright aroma, but it is distinguished by beauty and dignity. Moreover, the smell of dried porcini mushrooms is almost impossible to confuse with the aroma of other mushrooms.

Preparing mushrooms for drying

For drying, choose the strongest mushrooms, which must first be thoroughly cleaned of adhering leaves and blades of grass, and cleaned from earth or sand with a soft brush. It is not recommended to rinse porcini mushrooms before harvesting, since the presence of water significantly increases the drying time. Contaminated roots are cut off. Of course, you can dry the porcini mushrooms by placing the caps down on a sieve, but it is preferable to string the valuable mushrooms on threads.

How to dry

Porcini mushrooms are dried in a dry room, oven or in the air under the influence of the sun. Of course, it is preferable to dry forest gifts in the sun, then the quality and aroma of the mushrooms are better preserved. It is very easy to find out about readiness. If they become brittle, bend easily, then the mushrooms are ready for further storage.

How to cook dried mushroom dishes

Dried porcini mushrooms can be used to make stews, soups, various cold snacks, salads. When properly prepared, porcini mushrooms retain all their useful properties, and in terms of taste, they practically do not differ from fresh mushrooms.

Soup made from dried porcini mushrooms is considered a real culinary masterpiece. The lucky ones who managed to taste this miracle of cooking will be delighted with the taste and delicate aroma of porcini mushrooms. It is prepared according to a recipe that practically does not differ from the preparation of ordinary mushroom soup. Soak porcini mushrooms (50 grams) in water for an hour, then chop them, put in a saucepan with boiling water, add pre-fried onions (2 pieces), carrots (2 pieces), cook for 30 minutes. You can add potatoes and noodles. Instead of vermicelli, you can add cereals - rice or pre-boiled barley. But true gourmets believe that it is preferable to cook a soup of dried porcini mushrooms with noodles, since pasta emphasizes the indescribable taste of these forest gifts. At the end of cooking the soup, you can add a piece of butter to it, this will emphasize the taste and set off the aroma of the mushrooms.

Considering the question of how to cook dried porcini mushrooms, it should be noted that they are very tasty when fried. It is necessary to fill the forest gifts with ordinary water at the rate of: 100 grams of mushrooms per 600 milliliters of water. Leave to swell for a short time. Some people prefer to use warm milk instead of water. Then the mushrooms should be washed and chopped. Before frying, boletus may not be boiled. In a frying pan greased with butter, olive or other vegetable oil, fry the onion and add the porcini mushrooms.

At the end of frying, it is recommended to add a spoonful of sour cream to the dried porcini mushrooms, a little flour to thicken the sauce. A delicious dish with potatoes, vegetables, rice, pasta is served. Some culinary experts recommend using dried fried porcini mushrooms for stuffing poultry.

Quite often, dried porcini mushrooms are soaked overnight, then they acquire an almost fresh look, which they had before the harvesting process. Nutritionists note that the broth from dried porcini mushrooms is practically no different from meat broth in terms of calorie content and richness. Enjoy your meal!

Mushrooms love, if not all, then very many. However, their season is short enough. Therefore, thrifty connoisseurs of the gifts of nature prudently dry the prey in order to feast on it until the next harvest. Knowing how to cook dried mushrooms, you can enjoy mushroom dishes even in the dead of winter. And they will be no different from those prepared from fresh product.

How to cook dried mushrooms

Drying is used in soups, main courses, sauces. And everywhere it will be appropriate, if only you follow some simple rules.

The most basic of them: before preparing dishes from dried mushrooms, the latter must be soaked. The soaking time for different chefs is called different. Someone insists on an hour - they say, that's enough. Someone thinks that drying should be poured with water in the evening, and they can only be cooked in the morning. But most cooks recommend soaking for a couple of hours.

Water is taken cold and poured so that even the edge of the mushroom does not stick out to the surface. Better even pour with a margin: the mushrooms will swell.

Attention, feature!

There is a subtlety in how to properly cook dried porcini mushrooms. Experts insist that boletus should not be soaked in water, but in milk, and not cold, but warm. Then the final dish will be especially aromatic, and its taste will acquire a refined tenderness.

This move can probably be applied not only to porcini mushrooms. If you are not inclined to skimp on trifles, you can try soaking any kind of mushrooms in milk. And compare with the control batch soaked in water.

How much to cook dried mushrooms

After soaking, the product must be boiled. Even if in the future you have fried potatoes with mushrooms. Or even just fried mushrooms. The cooking time directly depends on the type of forest production and its size. It can range from 20 minutes to an hour. It's easier to focus on the "behavior" of mushrooms: if they have sunk to the bottom, then it's time to take them out.

On a note: if after soaking in water there is no debris and no sediment appears, it should be used for the broth, so it will turn out to be much tastier.

Just soup

There are many ways to make dried mushroom soup. For the basic recipe, in addition to the actual drying, potatoes, carrots and onions, you only need spices and herbs.

Mushrooms, soaked and boiled in accordance with all the rules, are caught from the soup and cut if, during processing, they have greatly "grown" in size. Frying is done in vegetable oil: first, chopped onions are browned, then carrot cubes are added to it, and finally mushrooms. After five minutes of joint frying, the vegetables are laid out in the mushroom broth, the soup is salted. As it boils, chopped potatoes are poured in, and after ten minutes the fire can be turned off. Pour into plates after a quarter of an hour, when the dish is infused. Serve sprinkled with chopped herbs.

Cheese soup

One of the best options for making mushroom soup from dried mushrooms. The main component is soaked, boiled, crushed. Mushroom broth is salted, potato cubes are dipped into it. While boiling, fry the chopped onion, and later add mushrooms to it. The fry is added to the pan, the vermicelli is poured almost immediately (it is better to take a small one). When it is almost ready (we ask about the cooking time in the instructions on the package), processed cheese is introduced. Stir the soup until the last component is completely dissolved. Before serving, the soup is infused in a saucepan under a lid for 5-10 minutes.

First, chicken and mushrooms

Having figured out in detail how to cook dried mushrooms, you can turn on culinary imagination and create. For example, treat the family to soup with forest gifts and chicken.

The broth is cooked either from the whole bird or from its parts. Only breast is not recommended: it will not be rich. To increase the dieteticity, you can drain the first water and cook the soup for the second.

Mushrooms are boiled separately; if desired, you can later add the broth to the broth. The frying is traditional, from onions and carrots. There is no need to add mushrooms to them: they are cut and immediately thrown into the broth. The chicken is preliminarily pulled out of it, disassembled into pieces and returned back. It remains to add frying, salt and pepper. There is no potato in this recipe, so the soup is light, although filling thanks to the mushrooms.

Bean option

For this soup, both the mushrooms and the beans must be soaked separately. Then weld separately as well. Chopped onions are fried in a frying pan (there should be a lot of them) with mushrooms added to it after getting "tan". Next, the contents of the frying pan and the beans are moved into the broth cooked in advance, and the soup is cooked for another ten minutes, so that its ingredients are saturated with the taste of each other. After removing the pan from the stove, herbs are poured into the dish.

Soup with dumplings and mushrooms

The recipe is multi-step, and the result is incredibly tasty. This time we will not boil the mushrooms, only soak, cut and fry until golden brown. When soaked, there should be 250 grams of them in a two-liter pot of soup.

The next step is to boil four large potatoes and mashed them. When it cools down, beat in an egg, add four tablespoons of flour and stick the dumplings.

Step number three: fry the onion and a small carrot. Whether to cut a root crop or grate, each housewife decides individually.

The fourth stage: sort out a third of a glass of buckwheat, fry a little dry.

At the last stage of cooking, all the blanks must be collected into a single dish. First, buckwheat is poured into boiling water, after ten minutes mushrooms and dumplings are loaded, after another five - frying, peppercorns and a bay leaf. Five minutes of waiting - and lunch is ready.

Delicacy soup

Traditional first courses, even varied ones, become boring over time. If you want hot and liquid, but are already tired of the "standard", try making a light and unusual soup according to this recipe.

It is better to take dried mushrooms or porcini, or a set of different, so to speak, mix. They are soaked, boiled and not cut too finely. Prepare more mushrooms, because apart from them there will be practically nothing else in the soup. Strong broth is cooked in parallel. Beef is recommended, but experimentation is not prohibited. The main component is laid in the base, and the broth boils for some time with the mushrooms to absorb their aroma. When the result is satisfactory to the cook, a dessert spoon of wine is poured into the pan and a small spoonful of sugar is added. At the same stage, the soup is salted and peppery, and you need to add a little more pepper than you are used to. Eggs are beaten well in a bowl, at the rate of two pieces per liter of broth. They are introduced into the soup in a thin stream, with constant stirring. It should be eaten with lots of greens and sour cream. Wine will give the dish an elegant astringency, while sugar will add piquancy.

And fry?

That we are all about soups and about soups. Since it's not a secret for us how to cook dried mushrooms, it's time to remember the second courses. An excellent side dish for meat and poultry will be mushrooms fried with onions. To do this, the soaked drying needs to be boiled, but less time is given to this stage - about ten minutes after boiling. Then the mushrooms are strained from the liquid to the maximum - just time will be found to cut the onion into half rings.

Now you need to dissolve the butter in a skillet - it is ideal for the embodiment of the idea. Onion chips are first fried on it, and after browning - strained mushrooms. It is necessary to fry with vigorous stirring, since butter has a lower resistance to sticking than vegetable oil. At the very end, the mushrooms are salted, peppered and flavored with selected spices.

Do not deprive yourself of gastronomic pleasure due to the fact that it is “out of season”, as cooking dried mushrooms is no more difficult than fresh ones.

WHAT TO COOK FROM DRIED MUSHROOMS

Mushrooms themselves are a very nutritious and tasty product, so by cooking mushrooms alone, you can already get a delicious dish. However, mushrooms are often used in various dishes as an additive to enhance the flavor and give the dish a specific mushroom aroma. For cooking, both fresh mushrooms and dried, salted and pickled ones are used. Of course, the best are fresh mushrooms, they have the greatest taste and will give potato or meat dishes a special appetizing taste, if you add them even in small quantities. Dried mushrooms can be used to prepare many dishes and it is very convenient because such mushrooms can always be at hand.

How to prepare the first hot dried mushroom dishes... Dry mushrooms are used for hodgepodge and sauces. For the preparation of first courses, mushroom broth is used, and even without adding meat, the dishes are tasty and nutritious. It is better to prepare mushroom broth from dried mushrooms. The dried mushrooms are washed and soaked in cold water for 2 hours. They are boiled in water in which dried mushrooms have been soaked. Mushrooms are boiled for 1.5-2.0 hours with the addition of onions, and the onion must be peeled and cut in half. Then, when the mushrooms are cooked, they must be thrown onto a sieve, strain the mushroom broth. Rinse the mushrooms with cold water and finely chop them to add to the broth. Now, any first dish can be prepared from the broth, for example, it can be cabbage soup from sauerkraut.

How to cook cabbage soup with mushrooms... You will need 0.5 kg of sauerkraut, 50 g of dried mushrooms, onions, a tablespoon of flour, 2 tablespoons of oil, 2 tablespoons of tomato paste, carrots. Sauerkraut should be rinsed with cold water if it is too sour. Then put the cabbage in a saucepan, add a glass of pre-cooked mushroom broth, one spoonful of oil and simmer over low heat for about an hour, covered with a lid. Then add mushroom broth, onions and carrots to the pan. Fry the onions and carrots in oil with the addition of tomato paste. Cook the cabbage soup for another 15 minutes. Then fry the flour in butter, dilute it with a small amount of broth and add to the cabbage soup. Season the cabbage soup with salt, pepper and bay leaves. When serving, put sour cream in cabbage soup with sauerkraut and dried mushrooms.

Mushroom hodgepodge recipe... You will need 50g of dried porcini mushrooms, 3 pickles, onions, 50g of olives, 2 tbsp. tablespoons of tomato paste, 3 tbsp. tablespoons of butter. Prepare mushroom broth as described above. Chop the onion and fry in oil, add tomato paste to it and heat for 2-3 minutes. Peel the pickled cucumbers and finely chop or grate. Put everything in the broth and add capers, salt, bay leaves to warm up for 10 minutes. When serving, add sour cream and olives to each portion.

Potato soup with dried mushrooms... You will need 3 liters of water: 60 g of dried porcini mushrooms or champignons, onions, carrots, oil, 1 kg of potatoes. Prepare the dried mushrooms and boil the mushroom broth. Chop carrots, parsley root, chop the onion and fry in oil. Put potatoes in the mushroom broth and cook until tender. When the potatoes are cooked into the soup, put the fried vegetables. Warm up for 5 minutes. Add salt, spices and bay leaves. When serving, sprinkle the soup with finely chopped green onions.

Mushroom caviar can be prepared from dried mushrooms. Dry mushrooms must be boiled for two hours, the broth can be filtered and used to prepare the first courses, and the mushrooms themselves can be thrown on a sieve. Then pass the mushrooms through a meat grinder. Finely chop the onions and fry in oil, then add to the chopped mushrooms, season with pepper and vinegar if desired. Mix the mushroom caviar well. With mushroom caviar, you can make sandwiches, stuff puff pastry baskets with it and use it for filling in the preparation of stuffed tomatoes.

You can make a delicious sauce from dried mushrooms... After all, fresh mushrooms are not always in the house, but what to cook from dried mushrooms for a change. We advise you to prepare mushroom sauce, with it you can diversify any menu. Mushroom sauce is good to serve with crumbly cereals, pasta, potatoes, carrot and rice cutlets.

To prepare the sauce, you need to take 50g of dried mushrooms, a spoonful of flour, an onion, two tablespoons of oil, a spoonful of tomato paste. Rinse dried mushrooms, soak and boil for two hours. Fry the flour in oil until brown, then dilute with two glasses of hot strained mushroom broth and heat for 5 minutes. Chop the onion, fry in oil and add boiled and chopped mushrooms and tomato paste to it. Then combine onion and mushrooms with diluted flour. Mix everything well, add spices and heat over low heat for 15 minutes. The sauce is ready.

Dried mushroom pie filling... Fresh mushrooms are rarely used for filling pies and pies, but dried mushrooms are great for this. By adding a little dried mushrooms to rice or cabbage, you get an excellent, tasty filling for baking from yeast dough. To prepare the filling, the dried mushrooms must be boiled as usual, then chopped finely and fried with onions in oil. Then the mushrooms can be combined with boiled rice or potatoes, mix well and the filling is ready.