This Creamy Mushroom Sauce uses both dried and fresh mushrooms for a sauce that is bursting with flavor!
I’ve been making this creamy mushroom sauce recipe practically my whole life. My mom made it, my grandmother made it, you get the idea. We make this sauce for Ukrainian Christmas and serve it over pierogies, though it’s delicious with lots of meals. This recipe is an adaptation of that. It’s full of flavor, and bonus, it’s vegetarian!
Scroll down to read more about how it all comes together or click here to jump straight down to the recipe.
What Kind Of Mushrooms?
I use both dried porcini mushrooms and fresh button mushrooms for this sauce. You could swap in some baby bella mushrooms for the fresh mushrooms if you’d like.
If you’d prefer not to use any dried mushrooms, I suggest substituting beef stock for the water in the recipe that would be used to re-hydrate the dried mushrooms. (Of course, then it’s no longer vegetarian, so keep that in mind.) To skip the dried mushrooms and keep it vegetarian, you can try vegetable broth but I’d add some dried mushroom powder or vegan Worcestershire sauce to make up for the meaty umami flavor.
How to Make Creamy Mushroom Sauce
First, you’ll soak the dried mushrooms in boiling water to re-hydrate them. You can learn more about using dried mushrooms here.
Sauté your onion and add in the fresh mushrooms, cooking until they are nice and soft, about 5 minutes. Next, add salt and garlic powder. You could add in other seasonings, some fresh herbs like thyme o
Then, you pour in the liquid from the dried mushrooms (not the mushrooms quite yet). That water is now full of delicious, earthy mushroom flavor. Once it’s mostly evaporated, you’ll chop the re-hydrated porcini mushrooms and add them to the pan.
Pour the heavy cream into the pan and bring it to a simmer. Now you have a creamy mushroom sauce that’s ready to take your meal to the next level.
What to Serve with Creamy Mushroom Sauce
As I mentioned before, my family loves this sauce over pierogies. But there are plenty of ways you can use this delicious sauce.
Serve it with white rice, egg noodles, or really any kind of pasta. Serve it over steak for a play on Steak Diane, or with baked chicken or pork chops. Use it as a mushroom gravy over your mashed potatoes.
There’s really no shortage of uses for this versatile mushroom cream sauce, so get creative and get cooking!
More Amazing Mushroom Recipes
Looking for more great mushroom flavor? Try my new Mushroom Rice or one of these recipes!
Podcast Episode On Making Mushroom Sauce
Listen to our editor, Christine Pittman, explain briefly how this delicious sauce is made, with great tips along the way, by clicking the play button below:
Listen to more Recipe of the Day episodes here.
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Creamy Mushroom Sauce Recipe
This Creamy Mushroom Sauce uses both dried and fresh mushrooms for a sauce that is bursting with flavor!
- Prep Time: 30 minutes
- Cook Time: 15 minutes
- Total Time: 45 minutes
- Yield: 6 servings 1x
- Category: Side Dish
- Method: Stovetop
- Cuisine: American
Ingredients
- 1 oz. dried porcini mushrooms*
- 1 cup boiling water
- 1 Tbsp. olive oil
- 1 small onion, minced
- 16 oz. button mushrooms, sliced
- 1/2 tsp. salt
- 1/2 tsp. garlic powder
- 3/4 cup whipping cream, or more if desired**
Instructions
- Put the porcini in a small bowl. Top with the boiling water. Stir. Let steep for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Strain liquid through a cheesecloth (see here for info on straining dried mushrooms), but do not discard the liquid. Set aside. Rinse the mushrooms and roughly chop them.
- In a large skillet heat the olive oil over medium heat. Add the onion and stir and cook until softened, 4-5 minutes.
- Add the button mushrooms and stir. Increase heat to medium-high and cook, stirring occasionally, until mushrooms have shrunk quite a bit, 5-6 minutes.
- Add your chopped porcini mushrooms and stir.
- Add the salt and the garlic powder. Stir.
- Add the mushroom liquid. Cook stirring continuously until most of the liquid is gone.
- Stir in the whipping cream. Stir often and bring to a simmer. Simmer for 1 minute.
- Remove sauce from heat.
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Notes
If you don’t want to use dried mushrooms, skip step #1. Then use room temperature beef stock in place of the mushroom water in step #5.
This recipe as written makes a sauce that has a large ratio of mushrooms to sauce. If you would like more sauce, add up to another ¾ cup of whipping cream. Follow the instructions as written except you’ll be adding the extra cream.
This post originally appeared in October 2020 and was revised and republished in September 2023.
Hi , I am the only one in my house that likes mushrooms.
Do you think this can be frozen? Maybe before adding the cream …or after?
Pamela, it would be best to freeze it before adding the cream, yes. Otherwise, you’ll risk it separating. You can thaw it and heat it up, and then stir in the cream just before serving and just warm it through. Enjoy!
This was delicious. I did have a difficult time finding the porcini mushrooms on my area though. I substituted fresh garlic for the powder.
This was delicious but in my area porcini mushrooms are hard to find. I also used fresh rather than powdered garlic.
Thank you, Rosalyn! For the dried porcini mushrooms, you can often order them online as well. Did you substitute a different kind of mushroom?
It says to rinse and chop the steeped porcini mushrooms. But the recipe does not specify when to put those in. Do they go in at the same time as the button mushroom? Can’t wait to try this recipe. Sounds and looks delicious!
Sorry about that, Haylee, I don’t know what happened to that step! After the fresh button mushrooms have cooked down for several minutes, you’ll add the porcinis, then the salt and garlic powder. I’ll fix the recipe card, thanks for pointing that out.