Savory Herb-Stuffed Mushrooms

My very first experience with stuffed mushrooms made for a pretty tasty lunch today. I've been craving mushrooms for the past few days so I decided to look up a recipe, and since I can't resist cream cheese these caught my eye. The recipe is from Semi-Homemade Cooking with Sandra Lee off the foodnetwork.com. 

The original recipe is actually for appetizers, so instead of 24 medium mushrooms I used 2 Portobellos. The only difference it really made was there wasn't as much of the mushroom stems in the stuffing as the recipe called for. I think it would probably be better with the more mushrooms as the original calls for...so the smaller mushrooms would probably be the way to go. However, I'm going ahead and posting what I did rather than the original recipe.

Notes:

• Next time I think I'll add some Mozzarella on top and allow it to melt in the oven 
• I could also go for some more cream cheese
• I eyeballed and taste-tested everything so I may be way off the original
• (from original) 24 medium mushrooms, about 1 pound
• (from original) 1 cup herb-seasoned stuffing croutons

Yield: Original recipe: 24 appetizers    With the Portobellos instead: 2 servings

Ingredients:

• 2 Portobello mushrooms
• 6 T reduced-fat stick margarine
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 1/4 t garlic powder, or 2 cloves of garlic, minced
• 3 oz. low-fat cream cheese, softened
• 3 T grated Parmesan (I did equal parts of Parmesan and Parmiggiano Regianno)
• 2 T chopped fresh parsley leaves, or 2 t drie parsley flakes
• 1/3 cup herb-seasoned bread crumbs

Directions:

Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.

Remove stems from mushrooms. Chop enough stems to make 1 cup (I didn't have enough). Melt 2 T margarine in saucepan. Brush mushroom cap tops with margarine, place top side down in shallow baking pan and brush undersides of caps. Heat remaining margarine in same saucepan. Add chopped mushroom stems, onion and garlic and cook until tender. Stir in cream cheese, combining with fork if necessary. Add Parmesan cheese, parsley and breadcrumbs/stuffing croutons. Mix thoroughly. Spoon stuffing mixture into each mushroom cap. Bake until heated through.

Tip: To make ahead, prepare as directed but do not bake. Cover and refrigerate up to 24 hours. Bake as directed.