Mushroom Pockets

Mushrooms have always been a favourite. There was a time when it was a rare commodity and I'd gotten into the habit of picking up a packet whenever I saw one. Now I live in a city where I don't have to even look and there's every variety of mushroom available in the shelves here. I hope to learn to use them all over time.


I found a punnet of assorted mushrooms in the supermarket the other day. The assortment was white button mushrooms, portobello mushrooms and shitake mushrooms. I brought them home and made these mushroom pockets. These are just like puffs, but they are made with shortcrust pastry instead of puff pastry.


For the pastry:


2 cups Flour

2/3 cup Butter

5-6 tbsp Ice Cold Water
1 tsp Salt


Place the flour, salt and butter in a bowl and mix together till the mixture resembles small peas. Gradually add the water and knead gently till it forms a dough. (Do not knead as you would for chapati/poori dough.) Roll out the dough and cut into squares.


For the filling:


200g Assorted Mushrooms, chopped

1 Onion, finely chopped

1 Garlic pod, finely chopped

1 tbsp Olive Oil
2 tsp Chilli flakes
1/2 tsp Thyme
1 tsp Parsley
Salt and Lime juice to taste


Heat the oil in a pan. Add onion and garlic and fry for a couple of minutes. Add the thyme, parsley and chilli flakes and saute for 1-2 minutes. Add the mushrooms and saute for 2 minutes.


To Proceed:


Preheat the oven to 180C/350F.


Place a little of the mushroom mixture in the middle of the pastry squares and fold over to form a triangle. Use a little water to seal the edges and press down with a fork.


Bake for 20 minutes. Enjoy hot.


You can serve this with some ketchup if you like. We enjoyed them as they were.