Beekman Cookbook / mushroom, spinach and fontina panini (pg. 199)

It rained all day today so the little man and I ran errands in the morning and then hid inside and alternated between playing, cuddling and getting some stuff done around the house. Despite having a few hard days because of teething, today was one of those days where he kept surprising me with how fast he is learning and developing. Skip ahead a paragraph if you want to get to the food portion of this post... 

I've been trying to incorporate H into helping me with household tasks instead of constantly moving him out of the way or rushing to finish what I'm doing before he demolishes it. Anyone with a toddler can relate but they are into everything and while it's super cute, it's also exhausting. Since he just wants to move and wiggle, especially during diaper changes, he now "helps" me when we're done. I carry him over to the trash can (nope, still not walking ;)) and he drops it in. We high five and he is so happy to be a part of the process. Honestly, while we've been doing this I just thought it was a fun and creative way to keep him from having a meltdown, but when I stripped him down for his bath tonight and half mindedly told him, "go put it in the trash", he crawled over, dropped it in the bathroom trashcan and looked over at me with the biggest, proudest smile. My mouth was on the floor. It might not seem big for people without kids but when you're constantly reaffirming your kids "say mama!", "where's the ball?" and they finally react and YOU taught them that thing - well, it makes all the long, hard days worth it. Can you tell I'm wiped from the teething? haha okay, on to the recipe...finally.

I've gotten into the habit of prepping dinner super early because I never know what our afternoons will look like.  Today, I sliced and sautéed the mushrooms and cut up the cheese during H's snack to cut down on prep time but these sandwiches will come together in under 20 minutes either way.

When we sat down to eat, my husband grabbed ketchup and I grabbed banana peppers but we each took a bite first and realized the sandwich needed absolutely nothing else. The mustard provides a tangy kick and the fontina cheese is somehow both sweet and spicy. The mushrooms are a wonderful way to round out the sandwich with some meatiness and leave you feeling super full and satisfied (but with that being said, I could have eaten like 3 because they were that delicious!).

Like all of the other Beekman recipes I tried, I was skeptical that these would be that good because the ingredient list was so short and simple but that seems to be the beauty of . We're adding this to "The Book" (where I keep all of our favorite recipes....which at this rate might be this whole cookbook.

NOTES:

• The original recipe calls for ciabatta rolls but I couldn't get my hands on any so I used sourdough bread. The ciabatta would have held up better against the wetness of the mushrooms but the sandwich still turned out delicious and sandwiches are supposed to be messy, right?
• I think any brown mustard will do. We used Dijon which actually worked out better than the spicy ground it called for because I find that can be dry in sandwiches.
• I plan to not make so many substitutes for future recipes because, well then I'm not doing really doing an accurate recipe review, am I?