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    Home » Wild Mushroom Recipes

    Dried Morel Gravy

    Published: Dec 29, 2017 Modified: Jan 26, 2023 by Alan Bergo This post may contain affiliate links 8 Comments

    Jump to Recipe Print Recipe

    A simple gravy made can be a great way to use up some of your dried morel mushrooms. Especially around the holidays when company's around and you can brag a little about how good of a mushroom hunter you are. Read on and I'll break down the details.

    Dried morel mushrooms from Minnesota
    Spendy little buggers, dried morels.

    If I've learned one thing, it's that less is more, and minimalism is how special ingredients are going to shine the brightest, especially those precious morels of yours you fought the ticks, elements and other mushroom crazed hunters to get.

    One of the easiest things to make with my winter morel stash is a good ol'bowl-a gravy. But before you ready the sails of your sauce boat for the journey, you should know the answer to an important question: how are you going to thicken it?

    Dried morel mushroom gravy
    Cornstarch yields a sauce that will stay transparent, corn and rice starches also don't form a skin, like a flour roux will

    Cornstarch vs flour

    In my world there's two doors to open. One leads to flour and the other cornstarch. (a third one leads only to butter, but that's another post) There's also other ways to thicken things like this, like using rice starch, arrowroot and other things.

    To keep this under 1000 words I'm only going to talk about the two most popular (from my experience). I use either method depending on how I'm feeling, but there are basic strengths and weaknesses to each approach, here's my opinion(s) and a couple other tips and ideas:

    Flour and or roux 

    Pro: Adds rich body. Quick acting. Can emulsify large amounts of fat if you like to save lots of pan drippings

    Con: Makes the color opaque if you have a really nice stock you're using, and if the flour isn't cooked out they can taste floury. Also easier to burn than cornstarch.

    Cornstarch

    Pro: Gluten free, less heavy handed tasting, keeps more of the see-through visual of a nicely made stock

    Con: Generally contains genetically modified corn. Also can have a particular flavor if used in excess. Less rich mouth feel than roux based sauces, which could be good, depending.

    I'm going to give you a recipe for both, but whichever you choose it's going to be good, as long as you have some nice stock, a few morels, and a piece of meat that's going to make some great pan drippings.

    I'll add that you can make this without de-glazing a roasting pan and it will still be great, but someday you need to try the deep, caramel sauce that comes from scraping up browned bits of meat cooked slowly cooked in the oven, if you haven't.

    Making sure the morels are in bite-size pieces

    It may not seem that big of a deal, but it's worth thinking about, especially if you mushroom averse people coming over for dinner, or you want to impress someone with a spoonful of only the most picturesque baby black morels. Hint: this is the best place to put the itsy-bitsy morels you picked last year when you didn't want anyone to find your patch, they're the perfect garnish.

    Depending on the species you were picking and at what time in the season too, you might have massive Iowa pigs that were a foot long, or some tiny black morels the size of a button, both will work.

    dried, re-hydrated morel, mushrooms,
    If you dry your morels whole, you can leave the small ones whole, medium sized ones can be cut into rings. Both help catch the sauce.

    For large morels, I re-hydrate them, then cut them into rings if medium sized, or chop coarsely if large. If the morels are very small, I trim the stems off to make them pretty, then serve them whole.

    If you can find small-bite sized or medium sized morels that will fit on a spoon, they'll hold pockets of gravy inside the cavity, and it makes them extra juicy. Don't go too crazy though, we want there to be pieces of morels, not whole mushrooms that are awkward to get out of the gravy boat/dish.

    Drying morels whole

    This is one of the best examples of why I don't cut morels before I dry them, since keeping them whole helps allows the cavity to fill up with juice, or allow you to have round slices (see picture above) that have a great texture.

    Dried morel mushroom gravy
    Dried morel mushroom gravy
    Print Recipe
    4.60 from 5 votes

    Morel Mushroom Gravy

    Yield: ~3 cups after cooking, enough to serve 4 mushroom hunters or 8 civilians
    Prep Time30 mins
    Cook Time10 mins
    Course: Side Dish
    Cuisine: American
    Keyword: Gravy, morel mushrooms
    Author: Alan Bergo

    Ingredients

    • 4 tablespoons cornstarch
    • ¼ cup water
    • 4 cups chicken or meat stock highest quality available, preferably homemade
    • 2 tablespoons unsalted butter optional
    • Kosher salt to taste
    • .5 ounces dried morel mushrooms on the small side. Depending on the size of your morels, this is about ¾ cup, or roughly ½ cup crumbled morel pieces
    • ¼ cup brandy or dry sherry

    Instructions

    • Re-hydrate the morels in the stock for 30 minutes, or until hydrated. Agitate the mushrooms to remove any grit, then strain the liquid and reserve both separately. Trim the morels into bite size rounds that will fit on a spoon.
    • When your roast, chicken, or other roasted meat is done, remove it from the oven and allow it to rest in a warm place while you prepare the gravy. Stir the cornstarch with the water and reserve.
    • Place the roasting pan on the burner on medium heat, then deglaze the pan with the brandy and scrape with a wooden spoon to loosen up the browned bits. Cook until the brandy is almost evaporated, then add the stock, trimmed morels, and cornstarch and bring the mixture to a simmer.
    • Cook until the sauce is thickened nicely, slightly reduced and glossy. Whisk in the butter if using. Season the mixture with salt to taste, then double check the seasoning one last time, transfer to a dish with a ladle and serve immediately.

    Notes

    Drippings are the best 
    Ideally, this is something you make when you're cooking a roast, since the pan drippings are what helps to give it such a great flavor. Make sure to cook your roasted meat or poultry on a rack in the oven pan to allow juices to drip down and caramelize.
    Using Kneaded Roux 
    Use the same recipe as above, but instead of cornstarch, knead together the following until you have a soft dough:
    • 2 tablespoons of unsalted, room temperature butter
    • ⅓ cup of all purpose flour
    When the stock comes to a simmer, whisk in the kneaded roux to thicken. Kneaded roux can be kept in the fridge and used whenever you want to thicken something, but I like to bring it to room temperature first.

    More 

    Forager's Guide to Morel Mushrooms

    « Galinsoga / Guascas
    Rosehip-Crabapple Jam »

    Reader Interactions

    Comments

    1. Larry

      December 30, 2017 at 4:20 pm

      When are you going to right a book????? I love reading your blog!!!!’

      Reply
      • Alan Bergo

        December 31, 2017 at 8:52 am

        Well, I've been working on a proposal this winter. The problem is there are so many ways that it could go and I'm stuck in the paradox of too many choices. There's already lots of field guides out there, and strictly wild food books can be a tough sell. I've been trying to figure out a hybrid version that I could sell to a big name editor. What sort of things would you like to see?

        Reply
        • Larry

          December 31, 2017 at 2:16 pm

          Well thanks for getting back to me! I think the same format that you have on your blog would be fine I think it should be a recipe and a discussion like you have here already !

          Reply
    2. Don Rutherford

      June 21, 2018 at 11:33 am

      Alan

      I have never made a kneaded roux. Or even heard Of it. Thanks. I will make it tonight with ground steak and morels. No time to cook a roast tonight.

      Don

      Reply
      • Alan Bergo

        June 27, 2018 at 9:32 am

        Great. It's buerre manie in French, Manepelato in Italian. A European thing from my understanding. Very useful, just keep some in the fridge and whisk a little in whenever you need. It will hold a long time in the fridge.

        Reply
    3. HED

      May 24, 2019 at 1:52 pm

      Could adding additional gelatin to the stock work? You could potentially omit the starch and take it more in the direction of a standard pan sauce than a full-on gravy.

      This is just the sort of recipe I've been looking for, though.

      Reply
      • Alan Bergo

        May 24, 2019 at 2:42 pm

        Adding addtional gelatin as in re: glace de viande or bone broth? I'm assuming you're wondering if you could remove the flour? Adding meat gelatin-rich sauces, etc, is great, but you'll need to reduce the sauce a bit more to get some of the water out so it has the same consistency. Also, adding too much gelatin, like glace made with pure chicken feet, etc, can give things a gummy mouth feel, if that helps at all.

        Reply
    4. Laurie M

      April 28, 2021 at 8:36 am

      5 stars
      Hi! A bit late to the party. This recipe is exactly what I was looking for. I live in France near the Swiss border and one of the region's signature dishes is poultry simmered in a morel and yellow wine cream sauce. I have made it once the traditional way and it was delightful, but I would like to try roasting the chicken, then making the sauce from the lovely drippings. I will probably soak my dried morels in Savagnin wine then make a gravy from the drippings and mushroom-soaked wine, finishing it with a touch of cream. If you have nerver heard of Savagnin grape wine, it pairs incredibly well with morels, try it if you have the chance.

      Reply

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    Chef Alan Bergo

    HI, I'm Alan: James Beard Award-winning Chef, Author, Show Host and Forager. I've been writing about cooking wild food here for over a decade. Let me show you why foraging is the most delicious thing you'll ever do.

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