A Casserole With Broccoli, Beer and Cheese Is What You Need for Breakfast
Hello and welcome back to Will It Casserole? , a column in which I take your delicious concepts and reimagine them as delicious casserole creations. This week we take our now famous and beloved hot dish – the broccoli cheese casserole – and move on to the broccoli cheese and beer casserole, as D. Hooper suggests:
He definitely had potential and I wanted this high potential potential couple to reach their full potential. However, you should be aware that you cannot “improve” the broccoli itself. (Trust me, this is empirical evidence I gathered while tinkering with the recipe.) Broccolini is too young and brittle to bake, and Romanesco is half way to cauliflower. (Plus, I think it’s really creepy.) Plain, green, honest broccoli is what you need, in fact, it is what you need. Likewise, there is no need to fiddle with fancy expensive cheeses – I’ve tried Dublin and onion Cotswald – as all the nuances are lost when melted in a vat of beer and condensed milk; an aggressively spicy cheddar will do.
Instead of eating canned mushroom soup, I fry the baby shiitake in oil along with shallots and garlic to give them an unusual mushroom flavor, and add condensed milk to keep everything juicy. The recipe includes rice because without it it’s just a cheese sauce with broccoli and beer. To make a casserole you will need:
- 1 head broccoli
- Butter 3 tbsp.
- 8 ounce young shiitake mushrooms
- 1 shallots, halved and thinly sliced
- 4 garlic cloves, minced
- 8 ounces beer (brown ale or stout will work)
- 10 ounces condensed milk (condensed milk without sugar)
- 1 teaspoon mustard powder
- 12 ounces chopped hot cheddar + 4 ounces for filling
- 3 tablespoons cornstarch
- 2 cups cooked rice
- 2 handfuls of chopped pretzels, mixed with 1 tablespoon ghee (for topping)
Slice the broccoli into florets, remove the stems and slice them into 1/2 inch coins. Submerge the broccoli in boiling water for one minute, then remove from the pan and shake in an ice bath. When it has completely cooled down, drain the water and set aside. In a large saucepan, melt the butter over medium to high heat and add the mushrooms. Season with salt and pepper, then cook until the edges are slightly browned. Add shallots, season with salt and, when translucent, add garlic. Cook for a few more minutes until the garlic is golden and flavorful and a fair amount of flavor is in the pan, then add the beer.
Scrape off any pretty burnt pieces, then add the condensed milk and mustard. Taste, season with salt and pepper if necessary, then leave alone and simmer. Until then, stir in the cornstarch and cheese, even if the feel is equivalent to nails on a chalkboard. Once your rich mushroom sauce has slightly boiled, add the cheese handfuls at a time, stirring after each addition to melt. After all the cheese has been added, try it out, make sure it’s good, and mix it with the broccoli and rice.
Sprinkle more cheese and then the pretzel and butter mixture and place in 375 degrees oven for 20 minutes, until bubbling around the edges. Wait a few more minutes under the grill for it to turn nice and golden brown, then let it cool for 10 minutes before serving.
Pile a great pile of improved casserole on your plate and thank D. Hooper for his great offer by toasting him with another beer.