Wild Mushroom and Apricot Ragout on Polenta Cakes

Aren't these cute?  I love fancy canapes.

I love sweet and savory things.  Mushrooms and apricots?  Well, whenever I think of matching ingredients I go to my bible, Niki's The Flavor Thesaurus .  This book is legendary.  It describes in extensive details all the wonderful ingredient pairings of the world.  It said apricots and mushrooms are like two peas in a pod so I trusted it and together in a pan they went.

Thank you Freya Gabbutt for the lovely photo by the way :)


Ingredients

1 cup milk
1 cup vegetable stock
1/2 cup polenta
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1 large onion, finely chopped
2 cloves of garlic, minced
1 cup mixed wild mushrooms, sliced
1 cup chestnut mushrooms, sliced
a generous splash of white wine
50g goat cheese
1/2 cup dried apricots, roughly chopped
2 sprigs of thyme


Method
Bring the stock and and milk to boil and whisk in the polenta.  Keep whisking until the mixture thickens and pour into a greased pan and let cool.  This can be done a day ahead.

Fry the onion and garlic in oil and butter until translucent but not colored.  Add the mushrooms and fry for about ten minutes until softened.  Add a generous splash of white wine and continue frying, add the thyme, apricots and goat cheese.  At this point if you'd like you could put it in the food processor and pulse it a few times until it reaches your desired consistency or you could leave it as it is.

Cut the  polenta into little squares and fry them in a little butter until crispy and a crust forms.  Then place the ragout on top, make it nice and pretty, and serve :)