One of my favorite tastes of summer is grilled portobello mushrooms. It is a simple dish that satisfies!
What is a Portobello?
Portobello mushrooms are the mature form of the edible fungus Agaricus bisporus, which also includes button mushrooms and cremini mushrooms. All of these mushrooms are in fact the same species of mushroom at different stages of maturity. Button mushrooms are the least mature, with cremini being the in-between stage, followed by portobello mushrooms, which are the largest, darkest brown, and most mature stage of the species.
Portobello mushrooms, also sometimes called portabella, are rich in flavor, and their texture is more meaty and less spongy than button mushrooms. Because of their large size, they can be stuffed, baked, broiled, and grilled. The caps can be removed from the stem, grilled, and served as a meatless burger alternative, with its meaty texture closely approximating that of a real burger.
Portobello mushrooms average around 6 inches across, with a dark brown color and firm texture. By the stage at which they reach full size, the caps have opened fully, exposing the gills and accelerating moisture loss, leading to a meaty, dense texture and richer flavor.
How to Serve Portobellos
Serve the shrooms as a side or pick a side to go along with them, making the mushrooms the main. Treat them as mushroom steaks or sandwich them between buns to make them mushroom burgers. You can also slice and serve them over grains with other fixings to make mushroom grain bowls. My personal favorite is to pair portobellos with a caprese salad.
Storage
Portobello mushrooms are best prepared and served soon after purchasing, but they can be stored in the fridge for 2 to 3 days. The best way to store them is loose, in the crisper drawer of your refrigerator on the humid setting, with a clean paper towel underneath. Plastic wrap is the enemy of mushrooms, as it promotes slime and mold growth. So if your mushrooms came wrapped and you’re not using them right away, remove the plastic before storing. This is also true for plastic produce bags.
Simple Grilled Portobello Mushrooms
To make these delicious marinated grilled mushrooms, you will need portobellos and a few simple ingredients for the marinade.
Before you start be sure to clean the mushrooms using the following method:
- Start by removing and discarding the stems from the portobello mushrooms — while they are edible, they tend to be woody and a bit fibrous.
- With a paper towel, gently rub off any dirt from the caps.
- Some like to remove the gills with a small spoon, by lightly scraping around the underside of the caps to remove the gills. The gills are edible but will turn your recipe a dark, unappetizing hue. This doesn’t bother me – so gills on!
Now that the portobellos are all cleaned up and ready to party, it is time to prep them for success. Enhance their flavor with a basic portobello mushroom marinade that plays up the portobellos’ earthy and umami factor. Umami is the fifth basic taste after sweet, salty, bitter and sour. It turns our portabellos are near the top for most umami flavor, just barely beaten out by shiitake.
Easy Portobello Mushroom Marinade Ingredients
- large portobello mushrooms
- balsamic vinegar
- extra virgin olive oil
- low sodium soy sauce
- garlic powder or minced garlic
- black pepper
- cayenne pepper optional
- chopped fresh rosemary or fresh thyme
How to Cook a Portobello Mushroom
You can cook portobellos on an indoor or outdoor grill, and because we aren’t fussing with internal temperatures, you don’t need to stress over food safety.
In a shallow dish, whisk together the marinade ingredients. Choose a dish large enough to hold the mushrooms in a single layer. Add the mushrooms to the marinade, coating both sides. A quick 5 – 10 minutes marinade time is all you need, any longer than 30 the portobellos will become too salty.
Place the mushrooms on the grill, and brush them with the marinade as they cook.
Cook for 3-4 minutes on each side. You will know the mushrooms are done when they have a slight char from the grill marks and are knife-tender.
Grilled Portabella Mushrooms
Ingredients
- 4 large portabello mushrooms
- 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
- 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
- 1 tablespoon low sodium soy sauce
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
- 1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper optional
- 1 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary or use fresh thyme
Instructions
- In a shallow dish, whisk together the marinade ingredients. Choose a dish large enough to hold the mushrooms in a single layer.
- Add the mushrooms to the marinade, coating both sides. A quick 5 – 10 minutes marinade time is all you need, any longer than 30 the portobellos will become too salty.
- Place the mushrooms on the grill, and brush them with the marinade as they cook.
- Cook for 3-4 minutes on each side. You will know the mushrooms are done when they have a slight char from the grill marks and are knife-tender.
