Eggplant

April 16, 2019 Dinner

Vegan Bolognese

This Vegan Bolognese sauce is a plant-based take on the classic red pasta sauce. It uses a variety of veggies, lots of fresh herbs, mushrooms, and lentils to unlock a ton of flavor. The texture of the sauce is thick and meaty enough to coat whatever pasta strikes your fancy.

Mushrooms belong in red sauce(?)

I grew up eating two main types of red pasta sauce. If my parents were feeling up for the task, they’d make a giant stock pot of a meaty bolognese with mushrooms. Much of that would get frozen and we could bring it out for several meals over the next month or so. If they were in a pinch for time, though, we’d almost always have a jar of Classico brand sauce with mushrooms.

Though it may not be part of a classic bolognese recipe, mushrooms just always felt right in the sauce. I realized this at the age of ten when I was invited to go camping with some Boy Scouts for a night in the woods. The host troop was gracious enough to serve us spaghetti for dinner. Being the young food critic that I was, I called them out on their Ragu brand sauce, which tasted bland to me. (I didn’t understand the rudeness of my matter-of-fact statement until my dad informed me of it later. Super embarrassing.) I didn’t know that it was the mushrooms that were lacking at the time, but now I can totally see how I could have found a mushroomless sauce bland.

Developing the Vegan Bolognese

When I was coming up with this recipe, there were a few different goals. The first was to make a delicious tomato-based sauce with the right consistency, emphasis on the word delicious. If it doesn’t taste good, it’s not worth sharing. I also wanted to use a wide variety of vegetables to make the sauce especially nutritious. And the sauce needed to have mushrooms, because of the important lesson I had learned as a kid.

With these goals in mind, I checked out a couple of recipes, including an omnivorous one from an Italian cooking site and a vegan one from Serious Eats. I got some ideas about how simple the sauce could be from the former, as well as how complicated it could be from the latter. I went for something in between.

What makes the Vegan Bolognese tasty

There are a few components that make the sauce delicious, but they can be summed up in terms of veggies, herbs, and enhancers.

The vegetable ingredients include onion, carrot, celery, eggplant, mushrooms, and lentils. The variety here creates a very well rounded flavor that just tastes savory. And there is the added bonus of nutritional diversity, too. The veggies are sauteed by themselves and then stewed with the rest of the ingredients. This makes it so that some of them get very soft (eggplant, mushroom) while others stay somewhat firm and give the sauce some toothiness.

The herbs include fresh garlic, basil, thyme, sage, and parsley. They are mostly added fairly early in the cooking process and mellow out as the sauce simmers. They add to the roundness of the overall flavor of the sauce and make it more fragrant. You can some fresh herbs to garnish your finished dishes and it will add a whole other layer of flavor depth.

There are a few different enhancers used to help the sauce pop – miso, soy sauce, white wine, and bay leaf. The miso and soy sauce elevate the other ingredients in similar ways. The glutamates they contain do that really effectively. The wine works slightly differently – I used it to deglaze the pot after sauteeing the vegetables, boiling it down until it’s completely evaporated. This helps collect the caramelized flavors left on the pot by the sauteed vegetables. It also makes the sauce slightly fruitier. Bay leaf adds a hard-to-describe aroma to the sauce that somehow makes the overall flavor more balanced.

I also included some shelled hemp hearts for extra substance and texture. And unsweetened, unflavored plant milk for a subtle creamy sweetness to balance the tartness of the tomato sauce and paste.

More than a few cooking notes before you start

The recipe calls for dry white wine, but you can use red wine instead. The flavor will be very slightly different but the overall effect of flavor enhancement will be there.

You can skip the hemp hearts if you like. They are sort of an added bonus.

The recipe makes enough for four servings. I recommend making a double batch if you have any doubts about the quantity being enough. The sauce freezes well and may get eaten faster than you expect.

If you’d like to make the sauce into a creamy version, you can add the cashew cream from my creamy vegan mushroom pasta (cashews, plant milk, nutritional yeast, optional dried mushrooms). Start by adding half of the mushroom cream, stirring, and tasting it. This may turn the sauce pink.

I try to steer clear from processed meat replacement products in my recipes, but if you’re interested in one, the “hot Italian” sausage from Beyond Meat is delicious and pairs perfectly with the sauce. Despite the name, this sausage is not particularly spicy. Just grill some up in a skillet over medium heat, slice them, and add some to each serving of pasta.

It’s OK to be generous with the olive oil in this recipe. I tend to add a bit more, maybe an extra half or one tablespoon, and it adds to the richness of the sauce.

It’s also OK to add more mushrooms than called for. They shrink down a lot once cooked and will make for great flavor.

The recipe recommends mincing or dicing the vegetables (onion, carrot, celery, eggplant, mushroom) into very small pieces. This helps create imitate the “ground meat” consistency of the original bolognese. If you prefer not to do so much chopping, and you’re OK with larger pieces of vegetables, you can just slice them.

You can use a food processor to mince the vegetables as well. This will save some time and energy but will produce a slightly different consistency (the pieces will be smaller and less distinct).

More Italian-inspired plant-based goodness

If you try this recipe out, let me know! Leave a comment, rate it (once you’ve tried it), and take a picture and tag it @gastroplant on Instagram! I’d love to see what you come up with.

Print Recipe

Vegan Bolognese

This take on the classic red pasta sauce uses a variety of veggies, lots of fresh herbs, mushrooms, and lentils to unlock a ton of flavor. And the texture is thick and meaty enough to coat whatever pasta strikes your fancy.

Prep Time15 mins

Cook Time45 mins

Total Time1 hr

Course: Dinner

Cuisine: Italian

Servings:

Author: Thomas

Ingredients

Vegetables

2 Tablespoons olive oil
2 cloves garlic minced
1/2 onion minced or diced finely
1 rib celery minced or diced finely
1 medium carrot minced or diced finely
1/2 pound mushrooms white or brown; minced or diced finely
1/4 large eggplant peeled and minced or diced finely

Herbs

2 Tablespoons fresh parsley chopped finely
2 Tablespoons fresh basil chopped finely
1 Tablespoon fresh sage chopped finely
1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves chopped finely

Sauce

1/4 cup white wine
1 bay leaf
1 Tablespoon miso
4 Tablespoons tomato paste
1/4 cup shelled hemp hearts
1 cup vegetable stock
15 oz canned tomato sauce
1 can cooked lentils 15-oz
1 Tablespoon soy sauce
1/4 cup unsweetened unflavored plant milk

Optional Garnishes

Parsley basil, and sage leaves, chopped finely
Grated vegan parmesan cheese
Nutritional yeast

Instructions

Heat olive oil in a medium saucepan or dutch oven over medium heat. When the oil is hot, add the garlic, onion, carrot, celery, and eggplant. Saute for 3 minutes, stirring continuously. Add the mushrooms, continue to stir for another 4 minutes. Add the chopped herbs and cook for 3 minutes, still stirring.
Add the wine and bay leaf and scrape up any bits stuck on the bottom of the pot. Cook and stir for 5 minutes, until the wine has evaporated.
Add the tomato paste, miso, and hemp hearts. Cook and stir for 3 minutes. Add the vegetable stock, lentils, tomato sauce, soy sauce, and plant milk, again scraping any stuck bits from the bottom of the pot. When the sauce returns to a simmer, reduce to low heat and cover the saucepan. Cook at least for another 20 minutes, up to 40 minutes to develop the flavor.
Serve sauce over pasta with any of the optional garnishes.

Notes

If you have any doubt about the quantity, make a double batch. It’s easy to eat a lot of this sauce.

The vegetables can be processed in a food processor to save time. Alternatively, you can just slice the vegetables and achieve a similar flavor, though the texture will be quite different from the intended meaty bolognese texture.

You can add slightly more olive oil and mushroom than called for, and it will enhance the flavor of the sauce.

You can use red wine instead of white wine.

The hemp hearts can be skipped. They add substance and nutrition to the sauce but are not essential.

The lentils don’t need to be canned. You can use pre-cooked lentils instead. The amount corresponds to 1.5-2 cups

April 15, 2019 Dinner

Mediterranean Buddha Bowl Meal Prep

This Mediterranean Buddha Bowl Meal Prep recipe includes a fragrant bulgur pilaf with pistachios and raisins, smoky roasted eggplant, steamed kale, blistered red peppers, zucchini, tomatoes, chickpeas, and a zesty tahini dressing. It’s a buffet of nourishing Mediterranean goodness.

Plants in “Mediterranean” cuisine

As far as global cuisines go, Mediterranean is one of the best in terms of its array of delicious, fresh, (and inexpensive) plant-based foods. I know I’m over-generalizing by using the term “Mediterranean”, a word sometimes used to describe food in Greece, Turkey, the Levant, North Africa, and the Arabian Peninsula. But, thanks to the Ottoman Empire and its proliferation of the best foods within its bounds, these places do share a lot of culinary customs. Ingredients such as olives, legumes, eggplant, peppers, and grapes are used extensively in all these places. And some of my favorite foods – hummus, baba ghanoush, flatbread, and tabbouleh (or variants thereof) can be found in many of these places.

Even before I started eating plant-based I was really into Mediterranean veggie dishes. One of the dishes I would make to procrastinate on my undergraduate studies was stuffed grape leaves. I made hummus using an immersion blender. And I would load up on falafel and salad for a cheap and filling meal. At a time when I was tempted to season food as heavily as possible, for maximum intensity, I found that a light, simple seasoning of lemon juice and tahini on fresh ingredients could be equally satisfying.

Making a Mediterranean Buddha Bowl Meal Prep

When I was coming up with this recipe, I had a few different goals. I wanted to make sure that there was a lot of diversity of flavor and texture, as well as a fair representation of the elements of Mediterranean cuisines. At the same time, I wanted to keep it simple and as homemade as possible and avoid ingredients that are uncommon.

The bulgur pilaf

The most complex component of the recipe is the bulgur pilaf. The bulgur is sauteed with onion, garlic, and spices and simmered briefly with raisins and pistachios. The fragrance of the spice is noticeable but not overpowering and there are a few different textures to enjoy.

If you’re not familiar with bulgur, it is a type of whole-grain wheat. It has been parboiled (i.e. partially precooked), so it doesn’t take long to cook. The texture is like rice, but a bit chewier and less starchy. It contains almost as much protein and more fiber than quinoa and is a versatile whole grain to keep on hand.

Roasted veggies

While there are a number of really delicious Mediterranean dishes that are made from roasted veggies, including baba ghanoush and muhammara, I stuck with the simple roasted veggies themselves. Tender roasted eggplant is dusted with smoked paprika to create a similar flavor as baba ghanoush made from smoky fire-roasted eggplant. Red peppers are roasted until blistered to release their inherent sweetness. And the zucchini slices are cooked until just tender, to provide a refreshing counterbalance to the other flavors.

The roasted veggies are cooked all at the same time (though not for the same duration) to simplify the process. The eggplant takes the longest, and the pepper and zucchini should take about the same amount of time.

Alternatively, you can roast the veggies in the air fryer if you’d like to make smaller batches. Or if you don’t have access to an oven (like me).

The other ingredients

Chickpeas, kale, and tomatoes make up the rest of the ingredients in the bowl and their preparation is extremely simple. The chickpeas just need to be heated and seasoned. The shredded kale is briefly steamed in the microwave and seasoned with a splash of vinegar. The tomatoes are just sliced tomatoes.

The sauce

I like tahini by itself, but wanted a dressing that captures a bit more range of flavor, so I added lemon, garlic, and cayenne. It makes a good all-purpose dressing for any sort of veggies and adds a bit of fat and protein, as well.

Potential additions and substitutions

There are dozens of different ways to customize your Mediterranean style meal prep

Prepackaged hummus, baba ghanoush, and tabbouleh are available at lots of grocery stores.

Canned stuffed grape leaves are also great.

Canned artichokes and hearts of palm, too.

Trader Joe’s makes a really nice canned fried eggplant.

Roasted red peppers can be bought in jars.

Pickled veggies, including onions, carrots, and peppers can be delicious, but check the salt content before you buy (some are absolutely loaded with it)

You can substitute other greens for the kale. If you’re using spinach or a salad mixture, you don’t need to cook them.

You can substitute couscous for the bulgur and use all the same seasonings, though you’ll need to follow the instructions on the package around the amount of liquid needed.

Cooking and meal prep tips

You can eat the prepared meal prep portions cold or reheat them. They’re delicious both ways. The dressing will be very thick when chilled and it may be easier to work with if gently heated.

If you reheat a portion, you may want to set the kale and tomato aside. The kale could risk becoming overcooked (and bitter) and the tomato could lose its freshness. I’ll leave that up to you.

If you’re curious about my other meal prep recipes, see my Japanese Buddha Bowl Meal Prep and my Meal Prep Page (to be updated)