Mushroom Pâté

I was really quite pleased with this mushroom pâté, it’s one of those things that’s so easy to do but, inexplicably, I’ve always bought it (at ridiculous supermarket prices!) instead of making it.

I used ground almonds to give it texture and a bit more body and chestnut mushrooms to give a more intense flavour. It was really handy to have in the fridge over the festive period. We had some with grilled ciabatta; it was great with rocket in a sandwich and it was also nice with crackers, a few tomatoes and a dollop of red onion marmalade. Multi-talented, easy and inexpensive…what more could you want?

I have to be honest here, this isn’t the pâté I made at Christmas, it’s the one I made this morning! On Christmas Eve I took some nice pics of it on the dining table with the Christmas tree in the background, but somehow I managed to delete the images before I’d uploaded them onto my laptop. Duh…muppet! Anyway, this is such a great recipe it was a good excuse to make it again just so that I could take its picture.

50g butter, divided into two 25g pieces

1 small onion, finely chopped

250g chestnut mushrooms, sliced

1 clove garlic, chopped

100g cream cheese

25g ground almonds

2 pinches of cayenne

¼ tsp of paprika

a couple of grinds of black pepper

1 tsp brandy

a few mushroom slices sautéed in butter

Heat the first 25g of butter in a saucepan and fry the onion gently for 5 minutes; add the mushrooms, turn them in the butter, put a lid on the pan and cook gently for 15 minutes. Remove the lid and cook until almost all the liquid has bubbled away. Take off the heat, stir in the second 25g of butter and allow to cool for 15 minutes.

Put the cooled buttery mushrooms, cream cheese, ground almonds, cayenne, paprika, black pepper and brandy in the food processor and blend until smooth.

Scoop the pâté into two large or four small ramekins and top with a couple of sautéed mushroom slices. Cover and chill for at least 3 hours before serving with ciabatta, crackers, grissini or crudités.

Serves 4