Baked Mushrooms with White Beans

Days are getting longer. And I got some adorable shoes on sale after stalking them online for weeks. And thanks to negative COVID tests, my backup dancers and I actually celebrated the new year with friends. 

I'm trying to buoy you with some positives before hitting you with some gloom.

Looking back on my posts from last January, I was reminded that this blog a chronicle of the zeitgeist, and that last January, the zeitgeist was seriously not good (see, for example, my Jan. 10, 2021 post). THIS January, I'm afraid that the zeitgeist is also seriously not good.

Thanks to omicron, school is again remote this week, and a parent can't help recalling the last time school went remote "for a week or two" and then kids didn't walk back into a school building for 14 months. Walking into stores seems ill-advised again. Going to the dentist seems ill-advised again. Enjoying oneself seems ill-advised again.

So all that is very deja vu, and we are all SO. TIRED. OF. THIS.

But up until last month, COVID felt like a question of "if": would I get it? Now it feels like a question of "when." And if I'm being perfectly honest, that's something of a relief: if there's no practical way to avoid it, then I don't have to obsess about every decision. But I can't shake the disappointment at not getting to live normally again, the worry I'll infect someone else if I get sick, the unease at harbingers like the recycling pickup getting cancelled and more and more items out of stock from my grocery service, the dismay at ever-increasing infection and hospitalization numbers, and the harrowing sense that on the whole, humanity is not smart enough to save itself.

But here's the thing: even though it goes against my nature, I am still mostly vegetarian after starting down that path in 2019. Why? Because even when I pour myself a consoling drink or have a little cry because things are lousy, deep down I still think there must be hope for us to conquer not just COVID, but also the slower-moving and even greater challenge of climate change. We won't succeed if too many of us lose hope and give up. It feels morally wrong to assume the worst, because that only increases the burden on those who are doing what they can to secure a better future.

One of those actions toward halting global warming is decreasing our consumption of animal-based foods. So I have a little cry, pour myself a drink, and then choose vegetarian options, most of the time.

I splurged on some fancy mushrooms for "Baked Mushrooms and White Beans With Buttery Bread Crumbs" (NYT Cooking; subscription required). Royal trumpet mushrooms! Oyster mushrooms! Yellowfoot chanterelle mushrooms! Their names alone brought me some measure of joy. But you could certainly make this dish with less fancy mushrooms and I am confident it would still be good.

I really liked the flavor. It was comfort food.

Mushrooms

Plus beans and feta

The final product

Some reviewers said there was too much broth: I disagree! I served it with a baguette (which was also my source of the bread crumbs in the recipe) and we very much enjoyed soaking up the broth with the bread.

We may not EAT a ham, but we can still BE a ham.