By Request: Vegan Variations
My friend and fellow Latin teacher, Jamie, responded to my request and asked for some vegan recipes! Although I am not vegan, nor even vegetarian, I do have friends that are, and I have been able to adapt recipes when they come for dinner.
In addition, when I worked as a recipe-tester for The Berkshire Farm Table Cookbook, there were numerous recipes for which I tested a regular version, a vegetarian version, and a vegan version! When this cookbook comes out (in May, click here to preorder) you will find a wide variety of options for different dietary needs.
I will mention that in the narratives of blog posts, I have often included suggestions for vegetarian or vegan possibilities. But I admit that someone who is vegan is less likely to click on “Indian Chicken with Cauliflower” thinking there will be suggested variations. But there are! So for today’s post, I look back on previous posts and offer some possibilities. Some of these I haven’t personally tried, so I would love to get feedback on these suggestions and anything else you see posted here.
Some beautiful tomatoes from the garden, stirring thoughts of summer!
As for yesterday’s post, Indian Chicken with Cauliflower, potatoes and chickpeas would be great substitution for the chicken to make it vegetarian. As for making it vegan, I think you could skip the butter, or use a plant-based substitute (pareve margarine is dairy-free), and use a vegan yogurt, and it should still be a great combination of flavors!
A pan of dressing (aka stuffing, from this post) can also be easily adapted to be vegan! If you want more substance to it, use vegan sausage, but I don’t think any sausage, vegan or otherwise, is necessary at all. If you do use a vegan sausage, depending on the brand, you may find it easier to sauté it whole first and then to slice it to mix with the bread. Then you would use a plant-based butter substitute and vegetable broth.
The sesame noodles are already vegan! Yay! Here’s the link to that recipe.
The Pantry Pasta, link here, only requires you to eliminate the anchovies to make it vegan. If you like capers that would be a nice addition, and a distinctive flavor to substitute for the anchovies.
Another recipe that is already vegan is this basic tomato sauce – of course without any of the optional meat additions!
And as long as we’re discussing pasta, the leftover veggie pasta is another easy vegan possibility – just eliminate the pancetta! You could also try some vegan sausage and see how that goes. As long as you use some starchy pasta water when mixing the vegetables and the pasta, you can get a nice coating of flavor on the noodles.
Risotto is another dish that is easily adapted to be vegan because it is the cooking method that draws out the starch and gives it creaminess. Many people are surprised to learn that numerous kinds of risotto don’t include cream. To adapt the beet risotto on this post, just use vegetable broth and omit the Gorgonzola. Be sure to dilute the broth – some vegetable broths have a strong flavor and could dominate the flavor profile too much.
On my post about the freezer being to full, which can be found here, there is a recipe for fried rice. In place of the meat, try some cubed firm tofu. There are also other wonderful products, such as baked tofu, some of which have flavors such as teriyaki that would work well as a substitute for the meat. In the sauce, replace the 1 teaspoon of fish sauce with an additional teaspoon of whichever of the other sauce ingredients you prefer, except for the sesame oil, for which a full teaspoon would probably overwhelm the other flavors. You can just eliminate the egg and it will still be great!
Finally, my brownie recipe! I first started making this recipe for a friend who is lactose-intolerant because I could use pareve margarine, and because Dutch-process cocoa powder doesn’t have any dairy, unlike many solid chocolates. (Nowadays there are many vegan solid chocolate options, but back when I first started making these, those were few and not easy to find.) Of course this recipe does use eggs. I have never tried this with any of the egg substitutes on the market, but I’d love to know how it turns out if you try it!
So please do remember to check my blog posts and recipes for any variations I might suggest to adapt to dietary needs. It’s not always possible, but I try to offer ideas when I can. And don’t forget, I’d love to hear your feedback, whether you cook a recipe exactly as written, or you try some of the suggested substitutions!