Why the Magic of Mushrooms at Plant-Based Michelin 3-Star Eleven Madison Park by Daniel Humm in Manhattan Have Gained a Starring Role on Menus Around the World
WRITTEN BY 5 REASONS TO VISIT® EDITORIAL STAFF
PUBLISHED MAY 2023 • 4 min read
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Eleven Madison Park by Chef Daniel Humm is a plant-based fine dining restaurant that has been awarded 3 stars from the Michelin Guide. At Eleven Madison Park, plant-based cooking has led them to see certain delicious ingredients and transformative techniques from a new perspective.
Source: Eleven Madison Park/Evan Sung
Ingredients like mushrooms and seaweed, and techniques like fermentation, which have long served an important supporting role in our food, are now leading players. They provide depth, complexity, and richness to all kinds of dishes on the menu, including some that you might not expect.
Mushrooms, in particular, have gained a starring role on their menu and are featured throughout the year. Each season’s menu includes a mushroom course—which, for spring, will highlight morels—and they are also used in broths, sauces, and seasonings for numerous other dishes.
As well as being high in essential nutrients like iron and B-12, mushrooms are rich in glutamates—the taste-enhancing components that are often described as “umami.” So, they work to build flavor and bring out the savory deliciousness in other ingredients.
Source: Eleven Madison Park/Evan Sung
One of the most versatile applications is their mushroom “soy” sauce, which is similar to tamari, but made with mushrooms instead of soybeans. Brock Middleton, Eleven Madison Park’s Fermentation Sous Chef, creates it by roasting mushrooms at a very high heat and making a mushroom stock base. He then uses koji, a traditional Japanese fermenting agent to break down the proteins in the mushrooms over time, allowing the sauce to develop a rounded, savory flavor. “We end up with something that’s very close to soy sauce, but with some mushroom notes,” Brock describes. It’s used in a number of dishes on our upcoming spring menu, including the morel course.
Mushrooms are also the foundation for many of our stocks, which are used for poaching, making sauces and broths, cooking rice, and much more. For subtle umami and depth, we often use a king oyster (also known as trumpet) mushroom stock. “King oyster mushrooms add depth of flavor, as well as a lot of body,” Brock says. “It’s one of the main stocks that we use in the restaurant for base umami and texture, but it’s not immediately obvious when you taste it that it’s mushroom,” he describes. It’s featured in the potato course and the silken tofu and pine nut course on our winter 2023 menu.
Source: Eleven Madison Park/Evan Sung
For a more intense flavor, we use mushroom varieties like shiitakes and creminis, and we also harness the power of dried mushrooms. “Dried mushrooms are always stronger when steeped than fresh mushrooms,” describes Brock. “The drying really changes the flavor of them,” he says. If you’re interested in cooking with mushrooms at home, check out their Oyster Mushroom Grow Kit, which allows you to grow and harvest your own mushrooms.
Note: This information is a story originally by Eleven Madison Park and was accurate when this article was published, but can change without notice. Please be sure to confirm all details directly with the companies in question before planning your trip.
