Warm Marinated Mushroom and Avocado Salad with a Balsamic Dressing

This weekend I went to Pizza Express twice!! I met up with two different friends, one on the Friday and one on the Sunday and since I don’t go to Pizza Express often I really enjoyed sampling their menu 🙂

They do the most amazing salads and on Sunday I tried a combination I hadn’t tried before…warm mushrooms with spinach, mozzarella, avocado and a honey n mustard dressing. It was simply delicious however being a typical foodie I wanted to make my own version using flavours I love and without the cheese.

They served theirs with buttery, garlic infused slices of mushrooms but I decided to keep my mushrooms whole for little bursts of juicy mushroom goodness! If you don’t like mushrooms that much or you’re not keen on them whole then just slice them before cooking. I omitted the garlic because I’m going to take this salad to work with me tomorrow and I don’t want to stink the office out 🙂

Mushrooms marinated in balsamic vinegar, herbs and chilli flakes

Marinated Mushrooms-

Vegan, Gluten Free, Low Fat

200g (couple of handfuls) button mushrooms or sliced large mushrooms
1 tblspn olive oil
1 tblspn balsamic
Pinch salt and pepper
Pinch chilli flakes
Pinch dried italian herbs

Place all of the ingredients in a pan on a medium heat and cook, stirring frequently to coat the mushrooms in the dressing and cook evenly, for approx 6 minutes. They’ll be ready when the mushrooms have turned golden brown and still has a little bite to it but juicy. Best thing is to take one out to try it 😉

If the dressing looks like its drying out then add a splash more oil and balsamic vinegar, dont let it reduce too far as you are going to use this cooking liquid as a delicious, rich dressing. You could add a squeeze of lemon too if you fancy however I didn’t feel the need this time.

I think these mushrooms would actually be delicious served as part of a deli platter or even poured on toast with some nice thick slices of avocado. In this salad I served them with the following items:

Mixed salad leaves
Chives
Parsley
Fresh tomato
Black olives
Capers
Avocado
Cooking liquid of the mushrooms drizzled over as a dressing.

Juicy balsamic mushrooms top off this fresh salad

I just have to let you know what else I ate because it was so delicious, after the Friday meal I was actually really excited to go back Sunday. The salads come with garlic dough sticks however I ordered mine without and instead had a portion of polenta chips (which I’m also planning on putting my own twist on next week). They were nothing like the polenta sticks I have made in the past, these were crispy and thin like chips, definitely tasted deep fried but oooh so worth it.

Then for pudding I tried one of the small puddings served with an earl grey tea, I had the chocolate truffle ice cream. It was so rich but a small enough portion to not be sickly. I’d really recommend it!