Creamy Garlic Mushrooms with Bacon is an easy to make, delicious, and surprisingly healthy side dish recipe. Rather than using cream, we use cashew butter mixed with a little water to make a healthy cream sauce that mimics the real thing so well that you'll never know the difference. This is a sautéed mushroom recipe that everyone raves about!
Ingredients4 strips bacon, sliced
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 ½ lb mushrooms
½ cup stock
3 tablespoons cashew butter
1 ½ cups water
1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves
Sea salt and pepper, to taste
Optional: 1 tablespoon nutritional yeast, see notes
Minced parsley, to serve
Method
* Add the bacon to a large pan over medium-high heat. Cook until the bacon is crispy then remove it from the pan. Remove all but 1 tablespoon of the bacon oil. (Or add oil, butter, or ghee if it is less than 1 tablespoon.)
* Add the garlic to the pan and let it cook for 1 minute. Add the mushrooms and stock to the pan and scrape off any bits stuck to the bottom of the pan. Cover the pan and reduce the heat to medium and let the mushrooms cook for 10 minutes.
* While the mushrooms are cooking, mix the cashew butter with the water. Once the mushrooms have cooked for 10 minutes, pour the cashew cream into the pan and bring it to a boil. Once it thickens (1-2 minutes), add the thyme and season it to taste with salt and pepper. If you'd like a thinner cream sauce, add water or stock until it is the consistency that you like. It will continue to thicken as it cooks.
* Add the bacon back into the pan and sprinkle the nutritional yeast (if using) and the parsely over the mushrooms.