Buckwheat Kasha with Mushrooms
Buckwheat toasted dry, then cooked pilaf-style with onion and mushrooms so the grains stay separate.
- Prep
- 15 min
- Cook
- 35 min
- Total
- 50 min
- Serves
- 4
- Revisions
- 2
Allergens
- Celery (via Vegetable Stock)
- Eggs
- Milk
Named from the ingredients as written, including those carried in from sub-recipes. This is not a guarantee — check the labels on what you actually buy, and note that a product’s recipe can change.
Ingredients
Method
Put the dried porcini in a bowl, pour the boiling water over them and leave for 15 minutes.
Lift the porcini out, chop them roughly, and strain the soaking liquor through a paper filter or a cloth, leaving the grit in the bottom of the bowl.
Tip the buckwheat onto a tray and pick out any dark husk or stray stone.
Stir the beaten egg through the dry groats until every grain carries a film of it.
Toast the coated groats in a dry heavy pan over medium heat for 4-5 minutes, stirring constantly, until the egg has dried onto them and they rattle loose and separate again.
Toasting is not optional here. The dried egg seals each grain and stops it bleeding starch into the liquid, which is the difference between loose kasha and porridge.
Tip the toasted groats out onto a plate.
Heat the oil and half the butter in a wide lidded pan over medium heat.
Cook the onion for 6-8 minutes, until soft and just gold at the edges.
Turn the heat up, add the sliced mushrooms and spread them in as close to one layer as the pan allows.
Leave them undisturbed for 2-3 minutes to take colour, then stir and cook for 6-8 minutes more, until the water they gave off has boiled away and they squeak against the spoon.
Cook them in two batches if the pan is not wide enough. Crowded mushrooms release water faster than it can evaporate and stew to a grey, slack mass.
Add the garlic and the chopped porcini and cook for 1 minute.
Tip in the toasted buckwheat, the hot stock, the strained porcini liquor, the fine salt and the ground peppercorns.
Bring to a boil, then turn the heat to its lowest setting and put the lid on.
Cook for 15-18 minutes.
Do not lift the lid or stir once it is on. Stirring breaks the softened grains and releases the starch the toasting was meant to keep in, and every lift lets out the steam that cooks the top layer.
Take the pan off the heat with the lid still in place and leave it for 10 minutes. The last of the liquid is absorbed in this stage and the grains firm up.
Uncover and fork the remaining butter through, lifting rather than stirring.
Taste for salt, scatter with the dill and serve with a spoon of smetana on each portion.