What is Doria?
Although it sounds Western, Doria (ドリア) is a uniquely Japanese dish that was created by a Swiss chef in Japan in the 1930's. Traditionally it was made by layering rice with seafood and then covering it with a blanket of creamy béchamel sauce. This was then topped with a layer of cheese that was melted and browned in a hot oven. It's cheap, comforting, and satisfying, which has made it a staple of home cooking.
Ironically, Doria is considered a Western-style dish in Japan, so most Japanese people are surprised when they learn it doesn't exist in the culinary repertoire of other countries.
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Why My Recipe Works
- Using a variety of mushrooms adds texture and amps up the umami.
- Rich, creamy bêchamel sauce is easy to make from scratch and elevates this dish way above canned soup.
- Blanching the green beans ensures that they have a tender, succulent texture.
- Maillard browning that occurs while sautéing the onions and mushrooms gives the Doria a deep, complex flavor.
- A mix of cheeses assures gooey goodness as well as luxurious flavor.
How to Make Mushroom Doria
The main component of this Doria is the mushroom and green bean béchamel, and while it's not complicated, there are a few tricks to ensure it goes well. The first thing is to sauté the mushrooms and onions thoroughly. This results in Maillard browning, which creates layers of flavors that tastes more complex than the basic ingredients this is made from.
Once the mushrooms have started to caramelize, they go into a bowl while you make the béchamel sauce. Don't let the French name scare you; it's just a creamy gravy made with a butter and flour roux and milk. The trick here is rapidly cool the roux by turning down the heat and dumping in the cold milk. This keeps the flour from cooking too quickly, giving you a chance to dissolve the roux in the milk for a smooth sauce that's free of lumps. The green beans, which I blanch first, get added into the sauce at the end, along with the sauteed mushrooms.
This gets assembled in a buttered casserole dish with a layer of rice, topped with the green bean and mushroom béchamel, and then finally a layer of cheese. I like using a mixture of Gruyere for flavor and Mozzarella for stretch, but you can use almost any cheese that melts, such as Fontina, or Raclette.
As for the oven, you want it to be hot enough to get a nice browned crust on top, but not so hot that the cheese starts burning before the rice is reheated, and the sauce is bubbly.
Finally, I like to top this particular Doria with some fried onions, which not only adds a crisp texture on top, it also fortifies the flavor of the caramelized onions in the sauce.
Variations of Doria
Doria started out as a rice gratin, but these days, the name is used to refer to almost any dish that has a layer of rice, a layer of sauce, and a layer of cheese. The rice layer can be plain, pilaf, or fried rice. The sauce can be anything from Beef Stew, to Bolognese, to Japanese curry, and the cheese can be anything that melts.
Other Rice Dishes
📖 Recipe
Equipment
Units
Ingredients
for casserole
- 1 teaspoon cultured unsalted butter
- 350 grams cooked rice (1 rice cooker cup)
- 100 grams Gruyere and mozzarella cheese (or other melting cheese, grated)
- Fried onions (for garnish)
for filling
- 180 grams green beans
- 1 tablespoon cultured unsalted butter
- 100 grams onions
- 120 grams button mushrooms
- 100 grams shimeji mushrooms (beech mushrooms)
- 1 teaspoon salt
for bechamél
- 1 tablespoon cultured unsalted butter
- 25 grams flour (about 2 ½ tablespoons)
- 1 ½ cups milk
Instructions
- Butter a 10-inch casserole dish using about 1 teaspoon cultured unsalted butter. Move the oven rack to the middle position and preheat the oven to 500 degrees F (260 C).
- Bring a large pot of salted water to a rolling boil and add the 180 grams green beans.
- Blanch the beans by bringing the water back up to a full. Drain the beans and rinse them under cold water to chill them enough to handle.
- Trim the stem ends off of the beans and chop them up into 1.5-inch lengths.
- Melt 1 tablespoon cultured unsalted butter in a frying pan over medium heat and sauté the 100 grams onions, 120 grams button mushrooms, 100 grams shimeji mushrooms, and 1 teaspoon salt until the mushrooms are starting to caramelize (about 6-7 minutes).
- Transfer the mushrooms to a bowl and add the remaining 1 tablespoon cultured unsalted butter to the pan along with the 25 grams flour. Cook the roux until there are no lumps of flour, but don't let it brown.
- Turn down the heat and pour the 1 ½ cups milk in at once. Stir the mixture vigorously until there are no lumps of roux remaining.
- Turn up the heat to medium and bring the béchamel to a boil to thicken. Add the sautéed mushrooms as well as the green beans to the pan, and stir to distribute evenly.
- To assemble the Doria, spread an even layer of 350 grams cooked rice along the bottom of the buttered casserole dish.
- Top with the mushroom and green bean béchamel.
- Cover with an even layer of 100 grams Gruyere and mozzarella cheese.
- Put the Doria in the oven and bake until the sauce is bubbly and the cheese has browned on top, about 15-20 minutes. Top with Fried onions and serve.
Nutrition Facts
FAQs
I've kept it pretty simple with a mix of button mushrooms and shimeji mushrooms, but you can use almost any mushroom with a lot of flavor, like Maitake, Chanterelle, Black Trumpet, or Porcinis.
I've made this Doria vegetarian, but it's fairly easy to add shrimp, chicken or some other protein to this. When you add it, depends on how long it takes to cook. For example, if you're using chicken, you'll probably want to brown the chicken first in the pan before you sauté the mushrooms (and then transfer it to a bowl while you brown the mushrooms). If you're using a fast-cooking protein such as shrimp or fish, you can probably add into the béchamel before you assemble the Doria.
Because there's tons of flavor imparted by sauteing the onions and mushrooms, it's fairly easy to make this plant-based. Just replace the butter with coconut oil for all the components, substitute your favorite plant-based milk, and add a little nutritional yeast to the béchamel. As for the cheese on top, you can either top it with coconut oiled panko breadcrumbs, or make a plant-based parmesan cheese with walnuts, nutritional yeast, and salt ground up in a food processor to sprinkle on top.
Doria is great for parties and potlucks because you can assemble it ahead and time and then bake it just before serving it to ensure the cheese is gooey, and the béchamel is piping hot.
Kiaya says
Marc,
Thanks so much for this recipe! If I wanted to switch out the vegetables (since this is such a versatile recipe) I want to make sure I don't add too many vegetables and have too little bechamel sauce. Would I go by a ratio, vegetable weight, or guideline other than trial and error you recommend I use to avoid this tragedy? Any advice would help! And I can't wait to try this recipe out in my next dinner rotation this month!
Marc Matsumoto says
Hi Kiaya, it will depend on the veggie you're using. Specifically on their density and how much moisture they contains. Green beans are relatively dense and low moisture so a quick boil is enough to prep them for this, but if you were to substitute in something with higher moisture like zucchini, you'd probably want to saute and brown them first to reduce their moisture content so the Doria doesn't get soggy. With leafy greens like spinach you'd want to use the weight after you boiled and squeezed excess moisture out of it. Something similar to green beans in cooking time and moisure content like asparagus could probably be swapped in 1:1 with the same preparation method. I hope this helps!
Maria says
Hi Marc, not sure if it makes much sense to comment at all since I didn't exactly follow your recipe, but it at least inspired me because I had leftover rice and mushrooms and thought of making doria. They were king oyster mushrooms so I fried them in butter with onions and deglazed with wine, and made a bechamel and mixed that without green beans. I topped with cheddar cheese because it's what I had and baked in the oven at 220°C - the rice was not very hot but still okay. Overall it was good, thanks for the inspiration!
Marc Matsumoto says
Hi Maria, thanks for sharing your variation. Doria is meant to be flexible (in Japan people will even make it with leftover meat sauce), so nice substitutions! As for the temperature, I used room temperature rice, if you used rice straight from the fridge, it might take a little longer. Also the thermostats on most ovens tend to be off by a significant margin, so it's possible your oven runs a little cooler than mine (mine runs +15 to -10 C from the target temperature as it cycles).
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