sausage and butternut squash stew

  

Overview

Time: 45 minutes
Dishes: large pot, measuring cup

Hello, hello Dear Readers!

I sit here totally stuffed! This stew is perfectly amazing - flavorful, with vegan sausage, cumin, fennel, smoked paprika, and topped with a horseradish crema. Really easy to make, too, but cutting that butternut squash has its own set of challenges, though there are tips and tricks to make it easier. 

For more info on how to cut your squash easily, check out my post HERE, or buy already cut squash, or go it the quick and dirty way: 

• use a sharp knife to cut the neck from the bulb, 
• peel the neck portion with the knife (as it sits on the cut end ; don't worry about how much rind you cut off - just cut!), and 
• worry about the bulb portion another time. 

I used Field Roast sausage in this vegan stew, but you are welcome to use whatever plant-based sausage you like. There is huge flavor punch from the cumin, fennel and smoked paprika to help out any mild-flavored sausage.

The butternut squash is a flavor affinity with horseradish, sausage and kale, therefore do not skip the easy to make crema; it will round off the flavors deliciously!  

If you need inspiration for your weekly menu, check out ours HERE.

Enjoy!

Speedy Cooking Tips:

• Gather your ingredients.
• Chop sausage while onion cooks.
• Chop potato while sausage cooks.
• Chop squash while broth comes to boil.
• Chop kale after squash is chopped.
• Make sauce while stew cooks.

(Printer-friendly doesn't seem to be so friendly. Just select the text between the arrows (including the white space to add margin on the top), right-click, select Print, and now it's printer-friendly. Can also be saved as PDF:  choose Save as PDF in Destination drop-down, instead of a printer.)

Sausage and Butternut Squash Stew

www.ZsusVeganPantry.com

Makes 4 servings 

weekday

Serve with crusty bread.

1. Base: Add the oil to a large pot over medium heat. Add the onion, garlic, fennel, cumin and sausage. Cover and cook until the onion is browned, about 5 minutes. Stir as needed.        

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 small onion, diced

4 garlic cloves, smashed

1/2 teaspoon fennel seeds

1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds

4 links (about 13 ounces) vegan sausage, sliced 

2. Roux: Add the flour and the paprika to the Base (flour first, so the paprika doesn’t burn). Stir and cook for 30 seconds. 

3 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1 tablespoon smoked paprika

3. Liquid: Add the broth to the Roux. Mix well. Bring to boil, reduce to simmer. Add the potatoes, squash and kale as they are chopped. Salt as needed. Cover and cook over medium heat until the vegetables are tender, about 15 to 20 minutes.  

6 cups vegetable broth

1 pound red potatoes, chopped (peeled, optional) 

4 cups chopped butternut squash (about 1 pound) 

1/2 bunch kale, sliced into thin ribbons

4. Cream: Mix the sour cream, horseradish and sugar. Serve the stew in bowls, add a dollop of Cream and add fresh ground pepper.  

1/2 cup nondairy sour cream

2 teaspoons prepared horseradish

1/2 teaspoon sugar   

© 2021 Copyright Zsu Dever. All rights reserved.

Pint It!

vegan vegetarian meatless plant-based

chicago deep-dish pizza - as easy as it gets

Overview

Time: 75 minutes
Dishes: bowl, large cast iron pan or springform pan

Hello, hello Dear Readers!

I really love deep dish pizza but it has always been such a chore, for some reason. This meatless, vegetarian, and vegan pizza, however, took me about 20 minutes to assemble, including the relaxing time for the dough. 

The breakdown of the difficulty is as such: 

• If you use a store bought dough, it's easy.
• If you make the dough, it's moderate, but 
• In either case it needs to bake for an hour, so difficult? 

Not sure how to classify something when you don't actively do anything to it, but I'm going with moderate in this case, assuming you make the dough.

Letting the dough relax in the pan for about 15 minutes allows you to be able to stretch it so that it reaches up the sides, otherwise it just springs back down. Drape the dough over the side, use a knife or a fork to hold it there (if it's relaxed, that's all that it will take) and then when it is layered, allow it to gather and scrunch up on the sides, as in the picture below.

I made this with Beyond Meat sausage, which is really tasty, but improvise: add all vegetables (zucchini and pepper are great), add seitan, add homemade sausage - you decide. I went traditional with vegan sausage and spinach. 

Enjoy!

Speedy Cooking Tips:

• If making the dough, prepare it when you have time and put it in the fridge.
• While the dough is relaxing/warming, thaw the spinach in water and squeeze dry. 
• Prepare any other ingredient and preheat the oven while dough is relaxing.

 

Chicago Deep-Dish Pizza

Makes 4 servings 

moderate

Preheat oven to 450-F

1. Dough: Combine the ingredients in a bread machine or food processor with plastic blade. Knead the dough until smooth, Dough cycle for bread machine and 2 to 3 minutes for food processor. Leave in bread machine or remove and set in a bowl to double, about 1 hour.

3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoon water

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon sugar

2 tablespoons olive oil

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

2 1/4 teaspoons yeast (1 package)

2. Add the Dough to an oiled 12-inch cast iron pan. Spread out to the sides and set aside to relax 15 minutes. Then press the dough up the sides of the pan.

3. Layer the ingredients on top of the Dough in order:  

6 to 10 slices vegan white cheese

4 links Beyond Meat sausages, crushed with hands

1 (16-ounce) bag frozen spinach, thawed and squeezed well

1 tablespoon pizza seasoning**

1 (28-ounce) can crushed fire-roasted tomatoes

2 tablespoons nutritional yeast

4. Arrange the edges of any dough hanging over the pan so it looks nice. Brush any visible dough with olive oil. Bake in the oven for 50 to 60 minutes, until the pizza is bubbling or internal temp is 165-F. Cover the pizza with a silicone mat when the dough is getting too brown. Remove from the oven and allow it to sit for 10 minutes. Serve.

 

 ** Pizza Seasoning: blend of dried garlic, onion, chili flakes, salt, basil, oregano. Substitute with 1/4 teaspoon of garlic powder, onion powder, basil, oregano and chili flakes and 1/2 teaspoon salt.

© 2020 Copyright Zsu Dever. All rights reserved.

shyoyo ramen

How many of us have actually had a really good bowl of ramen? Although the noodle soup is ubiquous in Japan, even there, chances of finding a vegan bowl of ramen is rare since many of the broths are made with some kind of animal stock.

Making the broth at home, even making it close to authentic, is easy and fast, but you have to make the base of the broth first.

Ramen first caught my eye when I was researching Vietnamese Pho for Vegan Bowls (Amazon, B&N). I was surprised to learn that the broth for the Japanese version of the noodle soup is much simpler and less involved in terms of spices and flavorings.

I added tofu and vegan sausage to my ramen, since there is meat in the authentic version, but you can add either, both or vegetables instead.

There are three kinds of Japanese Ramen:

1. Shyoyo - seasoned with soy sauce, tamari or shoyu
2. Miso - seasoned with miso
3. Shio - seasoned with salt

I made my version, Shyoyo Ramen, seasoned with tamari. The whole shebang was ready under thirty minutes, so it is definitely worth the extra effort to make this more authentic ramen soup, in lieu of boiling water and adding a packet of who-knows-what and calling it ramen.

Shyoyo Ramen with bamboo ramen noodles.

Shyoyo Ramen
Serves 4

1 (2-inch) piece ginger, cut into 3 slices
1 small onion, cut into ½-inch wedges
4 unpeeled garlic cloves
4 cups water
3 cups vegetable broth
1/4  cup reduced-sodium tamari
1 teaspoon toasted sesame seed oil
1/2  teaspoon dulse flakes
1/2  teaspoon sea salt
1 (10-ounce) package super-firm tofu, cut into 1/4 -inch slices
2 links vegan sausage, cut into 1/4 -inch slices on the bias
2 tablespoons sake or mirin
1/4 small cabbage, chopped
1 small carrot, cut into julienne slices
10 ounces ramen noodles
Scallions, minced
Togarashi seasoning

1. Heat a large pot over medium-high heat. Add the ginger, onion and garlic and cook until charred on both sides. Add the water, broth, tamari, oil, dulse and salt. Bring to boil and reduce to simmer. Simmer for 15 minutes. Strain the broth into a medium pot, discarding the vegetables. Season to taste and add the tofu, sausage and sake to the broth and continue to simmer until needed.
2. Heat the large pot over medium heat. Add the cabbage and cook to sear. Carefully pour the broth with the tofu and sausage into the large pot. Add the carrots and continue to cook until the vegetables are tender, about 4 minutes.
3. Heat a medium pot of salted water to boiling. Add the ramen and cook until al dente, stirring often. Drain.
4. Serve the ramen with the broth, tofu, sausage, scallions and togarashi.



 © 2015 Copyright Zsu Dever. All rights reserved.

zuppa toscanan

Zuppa Toscana is an Italian soup made of sausage, potatoes, kale and cream. I made a simple bechamel sauce to replace the cream, which is nothing more than cooking some flour in a little oil and adding the liquid. The flour-based roux thickens the soup and makes it creamy, therefore replacing the need for the cream.

I used ground Tofurkey sausage in this, along with seasoned lentils, but you can use either with equally great results.

I garnished my soup with some leftover Bacon Tofu from Everyday Vegan Eats (page 134) because I made a quadruple batch earlier in the week and I had a little bit leftover. The crisp vegan bacon was quite delicious in this soup and I recommend it highly.

If you have EVE and haven't tried the bacon, I urge you to do so...but go full out and pan-fry it because it gets crispy and crunchy and oh! so tasty.

Zuppa Toscana

Serves 4

3 tablespoons  olive oil, divided

½ medium onion, minced

3 garlic cloves, minced

2 cups ground vegan sausage (such as Tofurkey Italian sausage) OR 2 cups cooked lentils (see note)

3 tablespoons whole wheat pastry flour

1 ½ cups unsweetened plain vegan milk

3 cups vegetable broth

1 bay leaf (if not using seasoned lentils)

1 pound red potatoes, chopped

8 ounces kale, tough stems removed and chopped

Sea salt and black pepper

1 cup chopped prepared vegan bacon (such as Bacon Tofu from Everyday Vegan Eats)

½ cup minced fresh basil

1. Heat 1 tablespoon oil in a large pot over medium high. Add the onion, garlic and sausage, if using. Cook until golden,about 8 to 10 minutes. Remove and set aside.

2. Add the remaining oil and the flour. Cook the flour for 2 minutes and add the milk. Whisk well to prevent lumps. Add the broth, bay leaf, if using, the potatoes and kale. Season with salt and black pepper.  Bring to boil, reduce to simmer and cook until the potatoes are tender, about 15 to 20 minutes.

3. Taste and adjust seasoning. Remove and discard the bay leaf. Serve the soup garnished with  bacon and basil.

Note: Cook the lentils with 1 bay leaf, 1/2 teaspoon fennel seeds and 1/8 teaspoon red chili flakes.

© 2015 Copyright Zsu Dever. All rights reserved.

food trucks! vegan seabirds' tacos

The Seabirds Food Truck is based out of Orange County in California. The Great Food Truck Race welcomed them in Season 2. And these ladies run a VEGAN food truck! Heck yeah!

They left the race in week 4 after a slow start. They won the Truck Stop and the privilege to park in a money-making are of Manhattan, KS, but, they didn't work fast enough during service to make enough money to stay in the race. Such is life! Great food, good reception, but the attention to detail did them in. 

The Seabirds seem to be pretty popular. Above they are at the Ellen Show. And below they are visited by Moby. There are many other celebs patronizing their truck... let ME at a vegan food truck! That seems to be the way to go!

Their summer menu features Beer Battered Avocado Tacos. That sounds devine. I upped my ante and made Beer Battered Italian Tacos. I followed their same format, corn tortillas. cabbage, red onions, lime and jalapeno-cilantro sauce, but I replaced the avocado with slices of Italian Tofurkey sausage and yellow bell pepper. 

This was so good! That beer batter is amazing - it stays crispy even after I made everyone wait for dinner until the photos were done. Unhappy family during photo shoot, very happy family during dinner.

You can replace the sausage and peppers with thick slices of avocado, making this taco just like the Seabirds', or you can swap in anything. This one is a flexible recipe. 

Fry vegan Ho-Ho's if you must! 

Do they even make vegan Ho-Ho's? 

Beer Battered Italian Tacos Printer-Friendly Recipe

colcannon with corned sausage

Colcannon with Corned Sausage Recipe

I believe we all have some Irish in us and it is just a matter of tapping into our elusive ancestors. St. Patrick's Day is a reminder of this, for whether we are religious or not, most of us will wear green, drink beer, or eat Irish food in celebration of the holiday. "Party" is the term I believe most accurately describes how we Americans like to remember this day, whether with food or spirits.

There are numerous Irish dishes, such as Corned Cabbage, which we love at our house, made with cabbage, potatoes, carrots, onions and smothered with horseradish sauce, or the famous Sheppard's Pie, easily made vegetarian or vegan and spinning off various adaptations itself.

This Patty's Day, I chose to make Colcannon. Regardless of what you have heard that this dish is all about the potato or cabbage, it isn't. It is all about the butter. Authentically, around three pounds of potatoes and a head of cabbage would call for two sticks, or one cup, of butter. It's as if Paula Dean had a direct channel to the Irish. 

Traditional Colcannon contains potatoes, cabbage or kale, ham, green onions and butter. I decided to stick with tradition as much as possible, therefore, be warned, this is not a low-calorie recipe and if you choose to minimize the vegan butter, you do so at your discretion. This dish is amazing with all the called for butter, and while half would still be pretty good, indulging once a year is not going to hurt. Too badly.

I decided not to ignore the ham. I have read that it adds a lot of subtle flavor. I made Corned Sausage to replace it. I used Tofurkey Kielbasa as the sausage and cooked it in a corned sauce for a few minutes. Did the trick! You know something is done pretty well when your teenagers return for seconds of a dish full of kale. 

Or maybe, just maybe, it was the butter.

Cost Breakdown

potatoes: $3

cabbage, kale: $5

green onions: $1

sausage: $4

spices, butter, milk: $2

Total to make 6 servings

$15.00

braised vegan sausage and cabbage with horseradish sauce

We had such an amazing time last weekend, but are so happy to finally be home. 

Our Homeschool Conference in the Chicagoland area was tons of fun for the kids, tons of work for David and me. Fortunately along with the work and fun, some of us even learned a  thing or two. We are now back at home and I am again free to blog according to my ability and allotted time.

Since we were away this weekend and since a Patty's Day feast a microwave does not make, I am posting a belated Irish meal - cook at will and worry not about it being St Pat's Day. Enjoy the dish whenever the urge strikes.

This is an easy and quick open-faced sandwich of sorts, Braised Sausage and Cabbage with Horseradish Sauce, a take-off of the Corned Cabbage that the family loves but for which I did not have a whole lot of time to prepare. In its stead, I used a lot of the flavors and ingredients that are in the Corned Cabbage and made them into a quick dish.

The whole process started as a simple Sausage and Cabbage dish and morphed into the Corned-idea after Kate mentioned that it was a too bad that it wasn't going to be Corned Cabbage. That is all it really takes for me - someone lamenting over something I am NOT making - and the original dish veers off in another direction.

I braised vegan sausage, onions, peppers and cabbage in a corned-broth and served it over toasted whole wheat slices, drizzled with horseradish sauce. I also baked up acorn squash, left over from the produce box before we took off for vacation. Spring is here, so enjoy those winter squash while you still can! And partake of this dish whenever you see a scrumptious head of cabbage and a few links of Field Roast sausage calling out to you.

Cost Breakdown

cabbage: $3

sausage: $5

onion, pepper: $3

spices, herbs: $2

bread, vegenaise, horseradish: $2

Total to make 5 servings:

$15.00

BRAISED VEGAN SAUSAGE AND CABBAGE SANDWICH RECIPE

vine and dine + cassoulette

The final dish for Tami's Vine and Dine from Bryanna Clark Grogan's fabulous new cookbook, World Vegan Feast, is Cassoulette. This meal is a veganized version of the original French dish, which uses beans along with a variety of fatty meats. Bryanna uses vegan sausage, carrots, mushrooms and sun-dried tomatoes to achieve an equally complex and flavorful dish. I had no technical problems with the recipe and the flavors were great. Although the ingredients list is a bit long, as Bryanna put it, the recipe is easy to prepare. 

As for the wine, I'll hand it over to David, but I want to insert my two cents first. I did not think our wine added anything to the meal. By itself, it was a nice mellow wine, but with the meal, it was just okay. Unlike the few other times we have paired wine with food, this time it didn't enhance the flavors of the meal. I was beginning to think that wine always added or complemented the meal - until now. With this one, David and I didn't really see eye to eye. Wine disagreement!

The wine I chose to pair with the Cassoulette was the 2010 Orleans Hill California Organic Syrah.  This was a full bodied wine with a little earthiness and just a hint of pepper.  A little on the sweet side, until your pallet adjusts, but it worked quite well with the Cassoulette which enhanced the peppery flavor of the wine. 

vine and dine + lentil and rapini stew

This selection of Vine and Dine, courtesy of Tami Noyes, is straight out of Bryanna Clark Grogan's new World Vegan Feast cookbook. The selection, Lentil and Rapini Stew with Vegan Sausage, was excellent! David and I both love rapini and this was no exception. This is a simple recipe with really great flavors. I found it needed more broth than just the 2 cups called for in the recipe, but that might have been because my lentils were a little old (I had to use both French and brown varieties) and  they needed a bit longer to cook.

Also, since I love my rapini with tons of garlic, I added a few more cloves to the onions when they were cooking than the four that Bryanna calls for. Since David is not averse to garlic, this works out just fine. 

This is the third recipe I've made from this cookbook and it continues to impress. Great choice, Tami.

Here is David with the wine:

Tonight’s Lentil and Rapini Stew turned out to be hearty fare with bold flavors!  The fact that the wife added 20 cloves of garlic instead of the 4 that were called for may have capitalized Bold but we both love garlic.  We chose an organic La Rocca Vinyards, 2008 Chenin Blanc to pair with the earthy flavor of the lentils and the spiciness of the vegan sausage.  We were surprised by how well the complex structure of the wine, combined with it’s light hint of fruit (it made me think of pears as I savored the first glass) truly enhanced the bold and earthy flavors of the stew.  We don’t usually partake of white wines but, on this occasion, I’m glad we did because it turned out to be a delightful accompaniment for the evening’s meal.

FNF - bacon corn muffins with savory cream cheese frosting

Hey, y'all! 

Hope everyone has had a fabulous holiday season so far - there is more to come, with Kwanzaa, Hanukkah, Winter Solstice, Yule tidings, Christmas and many others I am sure I am ignorant of, to my detriment. Here's wishing everyone a joyous season. Winter has always been a favorite time for celebrations, given that the days are shortening, they are colder and bleaker and not much of anything happening out of doors, unless the proper preparations are taken and everyone gets bundled up. So what better time throughout the ages to throw a party? I hope to have much more coming up on this topic. 

For now, I am more focused on returning to this well-known, time-honored tradition of blogging, and what better way to get back in the blog-mood than with a Food Network Friday, hosted by our very own lovely Tamasin Noyes of American Vegan Kitchen fame, over at Vegan Appetite. 

[And if you don't have a copy, this is the best season ever to get one!] 

{And again, if you are craving some blog love from said Tami, get on board Food Network Friday yourself - she has tons of it to give out.}

What do my eyes behold, when I finally mosey on over to VA, but Bacon Corn Muffins. In my opinion, you could just call them Bacon Muffins and leave it at that. As anyone who has been a slave to Food TV knows, meat + cake is all the sickening rage nowadays, especially using bacon. Naturally, this  is the perfect recipe to duplicate, not only for the morbid curiosity it evokes (think: car crash rubberneckers) but for the sheer need to veganize the stupid thing! 

Two things need attention in this recipe: the egg and the bacon.

(1) The Egg: Super easy, folks! Ignore it. Forget about it. Useless and unneeded addition P.R.ed by the Egg Board. The starch in the muffin is enough to bind it. Think of it this way-- as long as you have starch in a dish, one egg = 1/4 cup of liquid. I upped the 3/4 cup of milk to 1 cup and called it a day. Enough of this nonsense!

(2) The Bacon: Lots of fun here! You can use my Tofu Bacon recipe and then crispen it in some oil, use Fakin' Bacon tempeh, or what I did... used 2 links of Tofurkey Italian Sausage.  I diced 2 links up, fried them until crisp in olive oil and, after I removed them from the heat, added some liquid smoke. 

Now came time for the most important decision making part: what hot sauce to use. Oh, the possibilities.. the recipe author, Brian Boitano, gives no direction here! Louisianan hot sauce, Tabasco, Harrisa, Chipotle, Habanero, Frank's or..... Sriracha?  Yeah, well, I figured I'd go with the vegan masses and used Sriracha. In fact, I have never seen a condiment more embraced than Sriracha by the vegan community. I wonder if any of the other bloggers used the same?

Verdict: Loved the muffins. Weird. But true. The frosting was way too much, and the family was scrapping it off the little tykes. Just a thin covering would have been enough, not the called for 8 ounces for the 24 mini or 12 regular sized muffins.

Since a muffin does not make a meal, I also made Senate Bean Soup, with navy beans, some of the same Italian Sausage and a few veggies. According to legend, this soup has been on the menu at the U.S. Senate restaurant for over 100 years. It's been a long time coming in become vegan itself. 

Vegan Bacon Muffins Recipe

US Senate Bean Soup Recipe