Chickenless Stew & Dumplings

Stew made with vegetables and soy curls with herbed dumplings. Perfect food for fall.

As for the previous post, yup, the secret project is vegan Yorkshire Pudding and between the two of us, I think we've got it pretty close. When Lelly and I get the recipe perfect, then maybe we'll release it publicly. Maybe.

Chickenless Stew & Dumplings

Stew

• 1 large onion, diced
• 2-4 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 large starchy potatoes, diced
• 1/2 pound baby carrots (or diced carrots)
• 2 cups sliced mushrooms
• 2 cups (approx) TVP chunks OR soy curls OR seitan OR one to two cans of chickpeas (drained)*
• 3 cups seasoned/salted vegetable stock**
• 1 cup unsweetened soy milk
• seasonings #1: salt, pepper, sage, poultry seasoning (start with about 1/2 tsp of each, less if using ground sage)
• seasonings #2: thyme, marjoram, sage, dried parsley (start with 1 tsp of each but less if using ground herbs)
• 1 or 2 bay leaves
• 4 tbsp nutritional yeast

*use a 1/2 pkg of soy curls, rehydrated. If using TVP chunks then rehydrate in broth first, squeeze out liquid, dust with flour and pan fry in oil first (gives it a better flavour).

**If you’re using bouillon cubes, you can use enough for 4 cups. So if your cubes are 1 cube to 2 cups water, use 2 cubes.

Dumplings

• 3/4 cup flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/2-3/4 tsp salt
• 1 tbsp dried herbs (anything you want)
• 2 tbsp oil
• 1/2 (approx) cup soy milk

Directions

1. In a heavy pot, brown the onion, garlic, potatoes, carrots and mushrooms until onions are translucent and mushrooms are cooked.
    
2. Add in the TVP/soy curls/seitan/chickpeas and brown for a minute or two.
    
3. Add in the vegetable stock and soy milk and both sets of seasonings to taste (tastewise, it will come together more after cooking) along with the bay leaves and the nutritional yeast. Bring to a boil over medium high heat, then cover and simmer.
    
4. Check every 10 mins or so and stir. Continue cooking until potatoes are very soft (maybe 30 mins), checking and adjusting seasonings.
    
5. Make the dumplings by combining the flour, baking powder, salt and herbs. Then add the oil and soy milk and stir well. The consistency of the dough should be really really sticky.
    
6. Drop dumpling dough onto the simmering stew by heaping spoonfuls making sure the dumplings don’t touch. You should get about 5-6 large spoonfuls. They should just be on top of the stew, not submerged. Cover and continue to let simmer for about 15 mins. The dumplings will expand. Check one of the dumplings by cutting it in half to make sure it’s cooked through.
    
7. When the dumplings are done, remove them to a separate plate and stir the stew really well so that some of the cooked potato disintegrates into the stew and thickens it (you could opt for using a cornstarch slurry here if you want but the potato does a pretty good job).
    
8. Serve up the stew and put some dumplings on top with a pat of margarine over the dumplings.

Vegan Gumbo

This weekend I was pretty much laid up on the couch due to some back pain (sciatica, not fun!) so the boy made me gumbo on Sunday night with his mom's recipe (we also had some okra kicking around). They lived in Lousiana for a time and he has some Cajun blood in him. His mom is not Cajun but apparently she made the best roux back then. Roux takes a lot of patience due to the constant stirring and let me tell you, she has the patience of a saint so no wonder why her gumbo rocked. :)

Anyway, It was the first time I'd ever had gumbo and I loved it! He substituted Field Roast "Mexican Chipotle" flavour vegan sausages for the Andouille. We both thought it added just the right amount of heat to to the base. As you can see, I doused mine with a lot more hot sauce.

Gumbo's not the prettiest thing to photograph and I suck at plating and lack the patience, but I had to get a photograph to show his mom (she reads my blog). He did a great job on this. :)

I think next time, I'll try my hand at this. I wonder if I'll have the patience for making a dark roux. Probably not, but it will be fun to try.