Go vegetarian at grilling time

Portobellos are

hearty enough

to be a main dish

By BEVERLY MILLS

and ALICIA ROSS

WHEN we think grilling, we think meat: steaks, London broil,burgers and chicken breasts. But we've been missing a fast andflavorful vegetarian dinner by limiting our horizons.

Portobellos - huge mushrooms now the rage in all of our favoriterestaurants - are flavorful, nutritious and meaty enough to star asthe main dish at dinner. We didn't realize how easy they are to cookuntil we started to experiment at home.

These beauties are appearing in even the smallest grocery storesthese days, verifying their popularity. Portobellos are the matureversion of another favorite fungi - the cremini mushroom. Whilecreminis are the size of regular mushrooms, a portobello cap canmeasure from three inches to eight inches in diameter (although thereally large specimens are harder to find).

It's best to buy fresh mushrooms within a few days of when youplan to eat it. If a mushroom starts to lose moisture, that meansit's losing flavor. The texture is also compromised.

Portobellos come as whole mushrooms, as caps, or even alreadysliced. For today's super-simple Portobello Mushroom SteakSandwiches, buy whole mushrooms or caps. Because mushrooms areporous, they absorb our savory glaze of oil, vinegar and basil injust seconds.

Next time you think of grilling, think "mushroom steaks" and knowthat dinner is less than 20 minutes away.

Send us desperate tales of woe or everyday success stories andyour favorite quick recipes to Desperation Dinners, c/o United Media,200 Madison Ave., New York, NY 10016; or e-mail: ddinners@aol.com.

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