Sometimes, I need to break out of a food rut. I need to find something new to try. I need to find a use for the container of baby spinach sitting in my refrigerator before it goes bad. (Because sometimes I buy healthy food without a clear intention on how to use it which can go smashingly well or become horribly wasteful.) Wanting to try something new and simple for dinner and use my baby spinach, I found a recipe for Cheese & Spinach-Stuffed Portobellos at the website for Eating Well and it seemed to fit what I was looking for — different, easy and healthy.

Since I am a household of one, I halved the recipe to make two servings, saving one mushroom for lunch later in the week. Though to be fair, I probably didn’t exactly have the parmesan cheese. I’m a dairy kinda girl that way, but took the old line from marathoner Deena Kastor that the calcium is good for my bones.

Here’s the recipe which serves four:

Cheese & Spinach-Stuffed Portobellos

Ingredients

• 4 large portobello mushroom caps
• 1 cup part-skim ricotta cheese
• 1 cup finely chopped fresh spinach
• 1/2 cup shredded parmesan cheese
• 2 tablespoons finely chopped kalamata olives
• salt
• pepper
• 1 Tablespoon olive oil
• 1/2 teaspoon italian season
• 3/4 cup prepared marinara sauce

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Line a rimmed baking sheet with tin foil and coat with cooking spray.
2. Rub mushroom caps lightly with oil and season with salt and pepper. Place gill-side up on baking sheet and roast for 20-25 minutes, until tender.
3. Combine ricotta, spinach, 1/4 cup Parmesan, olives, Italian seasoning and pepper in a medium bowl.
4. Place marinara sauce in a small bowl, cover and microwave until hot, about 45 seconds.
5. When the mushrooms are tender, carefully pour out any liquid accumulated in the caps. Return the caps to the pan gill-side up. Spread 1 tablespoon marinara into each cap. Mound a generous 1/3 cup ricotta filling into each cap and sprinkle with the remaining  parmesan. Bake until hot, about 10 minutes. Serve with the remaining marinara sauce.

Nutrition breakdown

Per mushroom: 201 calories; 10 g fat ( 5 g sat , 4 g mono ); 28 mg cholesterol; 13 g carbohydrates; 14 gprotein; 2 g fiber; 680 mg sodium; 677 mg potassium;  Calcium (31% daily value), Vitamin A (25% dv), Potassium (19% dv).