The ripple effect: Why Good Food hasn't published a mushroom recipe in months

The Age

08-07-2025

Featuring medium-rare eye fillet surrounded by duxelles (finely chopped and sauteed mushrooms) and prosciutto inside a crisp puff pastry shell, the ostentatious dish requires a high level of technical skill (and patience) to master its many components.
Good Food contributor Nagi Maehashi, founder of the popular website RecipeTin Eats, says it's one of the trickiest of haute cuisine classics to crack. And she would know. Maehashi tested and tweaked her recipe many times before it became the centrepiece of her best-selling debut cookbook, Dinner.
Unfortunately, it also became a centrepiece of the mushroom trial, the court having heard that it was Maehashi's recipe that Patterson adapted for that fateful, fatal lunch.
In a statement on Tuesday, Maehashi said it was 'upsetting to learn that one of my recipes – possibly the one I've spent more hours perfecting than any other – something I created to bring joy and happiness, is entangled in a tragic situation'.
The dish's complexity undoubtedly explains why, according to evidence given in court, Patterson returned to the supermarket several times to restock on the key ingredients for the dish, including almost three kilograms of puff pastry, a kilogram of sliced mushrooms, and several eye fillets.
Despite having more than 10,000 recipes in Good Food's collection, beef Wellington is one dish we don't have, and that situation is unlikely to change.
But as the mother of two sons who have dabbled in vegetarianism, I'm conscious of how important mushrooms are as a source of protein, nutrients and umami flavour for vegetarians, vegans, and anyone trying to reduce their meat consumption.
Australians have long appreciated button and field mushrooms. They're a staple of 'big brekkies' at cafes across the land. In the past decade, we have begun to dabble with a wider range of fungi, including locally grown enoki, shiitake, king oyster and lion's mane.
Now the court case has ended, I look forward to bringing to light the other mushroom recipes I've had on hold for months.