Spinach Artichoke Stuffed Mushrooms
Mushroom caps filled with the dip, cooked on a grate in foil. The frozen spinach rides in as an ice pack.
- calories
- 320
- weight
- 7 oz
- cal / oz
- 46
- protein
- 14 g
- serves
- 4, scales
- prep
- 15 min
- cook
- 18 min
- total time
- 33 min
- water
- none
- cost
- $$
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Snack
- Dinner
- Grill grate
- Dutch oven
- Campfire coals
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Vegetarian
- Gluten free
- Nut free
- Foil packet
- Pre-mix at home
- Needs a cooler
- Basic
Ingredients
| White or baby bella mushrooms | 24 medium | pick caps wide enough to hold a spoonful |
|---|---|---|
| Canned artichoke hearts | 1 can (14 oz) | drained hard and chopped small |
| Frozen chopped spinach | 10 oz package | packs as cooler ice, thawed by day two |
| Cream cheese | 8 oz | softened before you leave the truck |
| Shredded mozzarella | 1 cup | |
| Grated parmesan | 1/4 cup | the shelf-stable green-can kind is fine |
| Sour cream or plain Greek yogurt | 1/4 cup | |
| Mayonnaise | 1/4 cup | single-serve packets if you want no jar |
| Garlic | 2 cloves, minced | or 1/2 tsp granulated |
| Salt and black pepper | 1/2 tsp each | |
| Dried parsley | 1 tsp |
Method
- Twist the stems out of the mushrooms and wipe the caps with a damp bandana. Do not rinse them. They soak up water and steam instead of browning.
- Squeeze the thawed spinach out over the dirt until it stops dripping. Wet spinach makes wet filling, and wet filling runs out of the caps.
- In the pot or a bag, mash the cream cheese with the sour cream, mayo, garlic, salt, and pepper. Fold in the spinach, chopped artichoke, mozzarella, and parmesan.
- Pack a heaping spoonful into each cap. Set them on a doubled sheet of heavy foil with the edges turned up. Do not seal it flat or the tops will never brown.
- Set the foil on a grate over medium coals, or in a Dutch oven with coals on the lid. Cook 15 to 20 minutes, until the mushrooms give up liquid and the cheese browns at the edges.
- Scatter the parsley over the top. Eat them hot. They go rubbery cold.
This is a party appetizer that survives being dragged to a fire ring, but only if you deal with water. Mushrooms are mostly water, frozen spinach is mostly water, and canned artichokes sit in brine. Squeeze and drain all three and you get filling that stays in the cap. Skip it and you get a foil sheet of grey soup.
The air fryer and the oven both come down to dry heat from above, which a grate over coals or a Dutch oven with lid coals does fine. Mixing the filling at home is the real change. Cream cheese, mayo, and shredded cheese are all cooler food with a short leash, so make this the first or second night out and keep the bag buried in ice until the fire is ready.
Packing
Mix the whole filling at home and carry it in a quart freezer bag. In camp you cut a corner off the bag and squeeze it into the caps, which beats stirring dairy in the dark. Mushrooms go in a rigid container or they arrive as gills and crumbs. The frozen spinach block earns its weight cooling the rest of the cooler on the drive in.
Variations
- Swap Greek yogurt for both the sour cream and the mayo. Less fat, more protein, less tang.
- No mushrooms left whole after the drive? Chop everything, stir it into the filling, and heat it in a pot as dip.
- A handful of crumbled bacon in the filling if the trip is not vegetarian.
https://domesticsuperhero.com/spinach-artichoke-stuffed-mushrooms-air-fry-or-bake