STUFFED MUSHROOMS WITH PESTO

This recipe was one I created as a way to get more beans into my diet and also as a recipe for the recent detox program I ran which meant it had to be gluten free, dairy free and sugar free. I love cooking with black beans and kidney beans but do not use white beans very often and am always looking for new meatless Monday meals. Beans are such a fantastic source of fibre and combined with the walnuts give you a good protein hit too.   It was definitely a favourite by many in the detox program so I hope you like it too. The pesto I used can be found here.

Serves 4

Ingredients

4 Portobello mushroom, stalks removed
2 x cans cannellini beans, drained (or see note for cooking dried beans)
4 large stalks of kale, leaves only
¾ cup walnuts, roughly chopped
4 x spring onion, finely chopped
Handful of parsley, chopped
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon of lemon juice
¼ cup water
2 bunches of asparagus
12 mini roma/cherry tomatoes (or any kind)
Pesto to serve

Directions

Preheat the oven to 180⁰C.

Steam your kale until just wilted, drain, squeeze out excess water and finely chop. Use a food processor/high speed blender to blend the beans, spring onion, olive oil, lemon juice and water but stopping before it is totally smooth, a bit of texture is okay. Add in the kale, parsley and walnuts and combine. Fill each mushroom with the bean mixture and bake in the oven for 15-20minutes or until starting to crisp/go brown on top (I finish mine off under the grill if it is not browning enough).

Meanwhile grill the asparagus and tomatoes on a frill pan until asparagus is cooked through and chargrill marks have appeared.

Serve the baked mushroom with grilled vegetables and some pesto.