Our mission for New Year’s Eve was to bring a lo-carb appetizer to our friends Paula and Mike’s to nosh on before we all headed out to dinner. The day before, Russ did a little online detective work and came across this French Onion Stuffed Mushrooms recipe, about the easiest appetizer I’ve ever made, seriously.

Now you could make this a more involved process if you make your own dip, which I’ve been known to do in the past. But sometimes you just need to take the easy road, and you guessed it, this was one of those times. Company can easily pop one in their mouths without any other fan fare—or flatware for that matter.

The shrooms will shrink after the initial baking so keep that in mind when selecting them. And as they cool, they will wick more moisture, you want to eliminate as much as you can before you fill them with dip and cheese.

Ingredients

• 1 lb baby portabella (cremini) mushroom caps
• 3 Tbsp olive oil
• 1/2 cup onion dip
• 1 1/2 cups shredded cheese (Dubliner)

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 400 F.
2. Remove the stems from the mushrooms, discard.
3. Drizzle the mushrooms all over with olive oil and salt and pepper, to taste.
4. Place the mushrooms stem side up directly a rimmed baking sheet and place into the preheated oven for about 10 minutes.
5. Take out of the oven and turn the mushrooms over to drain the liquid that is in the caps. Let cool and mop up any further liquid.
6. Fill each mushroom with onion dip and top with grated cheese. Place the mushrooms back in the oven long enough for the cheese to melt.

Brush the caps all over with olive oil, and sprinkle with salt and pepper.

The caps will be full of moisture, so turn them over (and tilt the tray) so the liquid drains out. Once they cool, mop up any further moisture.

Once cooled, start filling them with French onion dip.

Mound the grated cheese over the dip and put back into the oven until the cheese melts.