Spicy Black Bean Stew with Masa Dumplings

This recipe is loosely based on Lazy Smurf's recipe which is based on a Saveur recipe. I saw the masa dumplings in Lazy's Smurfs post and I had to make this. I changed it up a bit because she mentioned that she was unsatisfied by the final result and also because I used my pressure cooker for the beans.



Here is my version:

Spicy Black Bean Stew with Masa Dumplings

2 cups dried black beans
water
1 Tbsp Olive Oil
1 tsp kosher salt

1 1⁄3 cups white masa harina
1⁄2 tsp. salt
1 cup of water

1 dried ancho
1 cup water

1 onion, diced
1 sm bell pepper, diced
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tsp cumin

1 chipolte pepper in adobo sauce
1 tsp adobo sauce (if you like it very spicy)
salt

1 bunch collard greens, chopped
1 tsp+ sherry vinegar
salt and pepper

2 Tbsp cilantro, chopped
1 lime (juice)

cooked brown rice



Sort black beans and rinse. Soak overnight or add boiling water to them and soak for an hour. Rinse well. Put beans in pressure cooker and cover with an inch and a half of water. Add a tablespoon of olive oil to prevent foaming. Cook however long you normally pressure cook your black beans. This depends on age of the beans, type of pressure cooker, altitude, etc. I normally cook mine 15 min in my electric fagor (note that I am at high altitude). Then do a quick release, test the beans doneness and cook a few more minutes if necessary. My beans were old and actually required 21 min this time!! Add the kosher salt and allow them to sit for a minute or so. Drain the beans but reserve the cooking liquid.

Meanwhile, mix the masa and salt with water. Knead about 5 minutes. You should have a ball. If you don't you can add a little more water. Wrap in plastic wrap and set aside.

Also meanwhile, cover the dried ancho with boiling water and allow it to sit for about 10 minutes or until soft. Remove from the water and destem and remove seeds. Chop it and put it in the blender with a cup of water until smooth. Set aside.

When beans are done, heat olive oil in a large pot. Add onions and peppers and cook till soft and starting to brown. Add garlic and cumin and cook for another minute. Add the blended ancho/water and the chipolte and adobo sauce. Cook for about a minute. Add the beans and enough cooking water to cover them. Save any remaining cooking water as you may want to add it later. Add salt to taste. Simmer for about 10 minutes.

Make 1/2 inch to 1 inch sized masa balls from the masa dough (we liked them on the smaller side). Add them to the stew. Simmer for about 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a skillet, heat 1 Tbsp olive oil over med heat. Add collard greens and toss. Add a few tablespoons of water and cover. Steam the collards until tender. Check on them every few minutes and add more water as necessary. This will take about 5-10 min. When done, add sherry vinegar, salt and pepper, and cook for about 30 seconds. Add to the stew.

Add the juice of 1 lime and the cilantro.

Serve with brown rice.

Hellagood Seitan Stew

On Weds., I asked my husband what kind of soup or stew he wants Friday. I always make a soup or stew on Friday nights in the winter so that he can take leftovers in his thermos on Saturday for ski patrol. He replied that he wanted a stew. I asked, "like a chunky vegetable stew?". He said, "more like a beef stew". Well the gauntlet had been thrown. We'd never made a vegan "beef" stew that we liked much. The existing recipes we tried were always bland or just plain eww. I knew I could do better. And I did. This stew was spectacular! It smelled spectacular and tasted great... and looks scarily a little too much like beef stew.





The first part of getting this right, was getting the seitan right. I made the seitan the day before because it takes a while. To get the texture just right, I boiled it and then baked it. The seitan recipe is below.

This seitan stew recipe is adapted from an Emeril beef stew recipe.

'Beefy' Seitan Stew
Serves 6
Ingredients

1 recipe Seitan - beef style (recipe below - make a day ahead of time)
~3 tablespoons olive oil
Spice mixture ->
      1/4 tsp kosher salt
      1/8 tsp pepper
      1/4 tsp paprika
      1/4 tsp garlic powder
      1/8 tsp onion powder
      pinch cayenne
      1/8 tsp dried oregano, crumbled
      1/8 tsp dried thyme, crumbled
2 tablespoons earth balance
8 oz cremini mushrooms, quartered
1 large roughly chopped yellow onion
2-3 sliced carrots, (1-inch slices cut crosswise on a diagonal)
2 celery stalks, roughly chopped
3 cloves roughly chopped garlic 
4 tablespoons all-purpose flour
4 1/2 cups beef style vegetarian stock or vegetable stock, at room temperature**
1 cup red wine
4 tablespoons tomato paste
1 large sprig fresh thyme
1 sprig fresh rosemary
1/4 teaspoon ground allspice
3 to 4 cups 1-inch dice peeled yukon gold or red potatoes
1 cup frozen green peas, thawed
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley leaves
Steamed rice

Directions

Chop the seitan into bite size pieces and season the seitan by sprinkling with the spice mixture, being sure to toss the seitan well to evenly cover with the spices. Set a non-stick skillet or non-stick dutch oven oven (preferred) over medium-high heat. Add 1 tablespoon of the olive oil to the pot. Add the seitan to the pot and cook until browned on all sides. Remove the seitan from the pot and set aside.

If you used a skillet above for the seitan, nows the time to pull out the big pot for the stew and heat it up. Add the margarine and 1 Tbsp oilve oil and mushrooms to the pot and cook, stirring occasionally, until well browned, about 3 minutes. Add the onions, carrots and celery and saute until onions are softened and lightly caramelized, about 3 minutes. Add the garlic and cook for 30 seconds. Sprinkle the flour over the vegetables and cook, stirring, for about 3 minutes.

Add the wine and cook for about 30 seconds. Add the stock, tomato paste, thyme, rosemary, allspice and browned seitan and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to a simmer, partially cover the pot, and cook, stirring occasionally for 40 minutes.

Add the potatoes to the stew and partially cover the pot with a lid. Continue cooking until the potatoes are very tender, about 45 minutes (to an hour). Remove the lid and discard the thyme and rosemary stems. Add the peas and parsley to the stew, stir well to combine, then remove from the heat. Serve hot with steamed rice.

** I used Edward and Sons Not-Beef boullion cubes dissolved in boiling water. This brand is so good that I buy 3-4 boxes at a time off the internet. For the stock for the stew - 2 Not-Beef boullion cubes to 4 1/2 cups boiling water.

Beefy Seitan
Adapted from The Vegan Lunchbox Pot Roast and La Dolce Vegan Beefy Seitan

2 vegetarian beef-flavored boullion cubes (See note above**)
1 tsp kosher salt - I cannot remember if I actually added this
1 1/4 cup vital wheat gluten
1/4 cup finely ground walnuts
2 Tbsp Nutritional yeast
1/2 tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp sage
3 Tbsp olive oil
1 tsp marmite
1 tsp tomato paste
1 tsp vegan worchestershire
1 Tbsp nutritional yeast

Bring 4 cups water to a boil. Stir in the boullion cubes and 1 tsp kosher salt. Let cubes dissolve while you work on the seitan.

In a mixing bowl, mix wheat gluten, ground walnuts, nutritional yeast, onion powder, sage, and garlic powder.

Then mix ONE cup of the broth with 1 Tbsp olive oil, 1 tsp tomato paste, vegan worchestershire, and marmite.

Add the liquid to the wheat gluten mixture and stir till it forms a dough. Knead until it comes together in a loaf. Cut the loaf into 2" square pieces.

Stir the other tablespoon nutritional yeast into the remaining broth. Add the gluten to this lukewarm broth and bring up to a simmer. Simmer the wheat gluten covered in the remaining broth (just barely a simmer) for 1 hour. This next part is important. Turn off the heat and let the seitan cool in its cooking liquid for 30-45 minutes.

Drain the seitan (reserve the remaining stock) and put it into a lightly oiled baking dish. Bake uncovered at 350 for 30 min (this will cause it to firm up). Remove from the pan and place the seitan in a storage container with remaining broth until ready to use.

Here are some in progress pics:

Browning the seitan


Cooking the mushrooms - there are some seitan bits and spices stuck to the pan, because I learned that needed a non-stick pot for that part.


Added in the carrots, onions, celery


Simmering the stock with the vegetables and seitan (before adding potatoes)


Finally done. Looks scarily real, doesn't it?

African Groundnut Stew with Kuri Squash

Last night we made African Groundnut Stew from Voluptuous Vegan. Groundnut, in this case, refers to the 1/4 cup of peanut butter that finished the stew. Yum! This is a recipe that has become a fall favorite in our house. We only get to make it in the fall when we are getting fresh local interesting squash. I always make it with a Kuri Squash which is the red one in the picture below.



It is a time consuming recipe, but the results are well worth it. In addition to Kuri squash, the stew also has roasted cauliflower in it, carrots, sweet potatoes, potato (instead of the turnip it called for because I had potatoes), garlic, lots of ginger, ginger juice, cilantro, onions, and scallions. But its the peanut butter, ginger, and the squash that are the real stars of this stew:

Seitan Bourguinon on Mashed Potatoes

This recipe is also from Peter Berley's book (his recipes take a long time and I was stuck inside this past weekend due to rain and snow); Seitan Bourguinon. I love any recipe that calls for a 1/2 bottle of red wine. This is a recipe I like a lot, but I don't really like bites of mushroom. I don't mind mushrooms if they are too small for me to notice them in the final product. So, I picked out all the mushrooms and ground them up in the food processor with some of the sauce and some water and added them back to the stew. I thought I would like this better than picking mushrooms out, but I really do like the sauce better without the mushrooms ground into it, so next time i will stick to the recipe. For the seitan, i used one batch of easy baked seitan (Vegan Yum Yum's recipe).

This isn't the best picture in the world and you cannot see the giant pile of mashed potatoes underneath, but it was quite tasty.

Winter Vegetable Mushroom Ragout on Polenta

Tonight's dinner was a Winter Vegetable Ragout from Everyday Greens by Annie Somerville. This was a very involved recipe and I made parts of it in advance. Even so, it still took me over an hour and a half to make dinner. I started by making a shitake mushroom vegetable stock and a roasted garlic puree in advance. The mushroom stock was then mixed with the garlic puree, sherry, soy sauce, and porcini mushroom liquid (after soaking). After that I made a roux with earth balance and flour and added the stock mixture. At the same time veggies roasted in the oven. 2 large portobellos were brushed with garlic oil, salt and pepper and roasted. Then butternut squash, rutabegas, fennel, potatoes, and onions roasted in the oven with garlic oil, salt and pepper. The vegetables were mixed with the mushroom sherry sauce and cooked. Then some swiss chard was added, and then the portobellos and some fresh herbs went in. I made some polenta while this was simmering and served the stew over the polenta.

Swiss Chard is fun to take pictures of:



Is this the most beautiful swiss chard you've ever seen?

Brunswick Stew

I grew up in Atlanta and had my share of bbq and brunwick stew before moving North and going vegan. Needless to say, I was intrigued by this month's VegNews magazine which had a recipe for Southern Vegetarian Brunswick Stew and Cornbread. I thought this might be a good stew but had no notions that this would actually taste like the stew that I grew up eating. My husband Mike did not either and was a little afraid of my dinner plans. After we started eating it, we were shocked to find it did actually taste like brunswick stew. SHOCKED. It was really good.



The recipe is from Robin Robertson:

Vegetarian Brunswick Stew

1 tablespoon olive oil
1 12 oz package vegetarian sausage links, cut into 1/2-inch pieces *
1 sweet yellow onion, finely chopped
2 large white potatoes, diced
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 1/2 teaspoons grated fresh ginger **
3 1/2 cups vegetable stock or water
1 (15-ounce) can diced tomatoes
1 (16-ounce) package frozen succotash
3 tablespoons tamari or soy sauce
2 teaspoons prepared mustard
1 teaspoon light brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/2 teaspoon Tabasco
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 (12-ounce) package frozen vegetarian burger crumbles ***
1/2 teaspoon Liquid Smoke

1. Heat the oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the "sausage" links and cook until browned, about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove the sausage from the pot and set aside.

2. Reheat the oil in the saucepan and add the onion, potato, garlic, and ginger. Add 1/4 cup of the stock or water, cover, and cook until softened, about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove the lid, add the remaining stock and stir in the tomatoes, succotash, tamari, mustard, sugar, allspice, Tabasco, and salt and pepper to taste, and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer, uncovered, until the vegetables are tender, about 45 minutes, stirring occasionally. During the last 10 minutes of cooking time, add the reserved “sausage,” the vegetarian burger crumbles, and the Liquid Smoke.

Serves 4 to 6

* We used only 6 oz lite life vegan sausage links. Next time we might try sausage crumbles instead, maybe lite life in the tube.
** Ginger People jarred prepared ginger works fine here.
*** Morningstar frozen burger crumbles

We served this with some vegan southern cornbread (modified from the article in veg news by Robin Robertson) cooked in an iron skillet.

Cornbread

1-2 Tbsp canola oil
1 1/2 cups cornmeal
1 cup all purpose flour
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 cup soymilk
3 Tbsp maple syrup
1 cup frozen corn, defrosted
1/4 cup canola oil

Place an 8" cast iron skillet in the oven with 1-2 Tbsp canola oil in the skillet. Place in oven and preheat oven to 400 degrees. Mix cornmeal, flour, baking powder, and salt. In another bowl, mix the soy milk, maple syrup, oil, and corn. Add to the dry mixture and stir until just mixed. Pour into the hot skillet, and spread it if necessary. Bake for 25-30 minutes until lightly browned on top. Turn cornbread out of skillet and onto a plate (it will be upside down). Cut into wedges.

Unbeef Stew (Rating = BLEAH)

Tonight we made "Unbeef Stew" in the crockpot**. We served this with a big salad. I hated it. It had that metallic undertone that often comes with pre-made vegetable broth. I didn't even take a picture because it was frankly just that bad. Skip this one!

We were supposed to make this yesterday, but I got started later than I was supposed to due to an appointment, and then the tofu was still frozen. I had taken the tofu out of the freezer at 5:30 am and set it on the counter and it was still frozen at 1. Tofu evidently takes a long time to thaw. It was a good thing that I was not able to start this recipe at 1 in the afternoon, thinking that we would eat at 8, because the drying out of the tofu took a lot longer than expected today. The recipe doesn't really give any good indication, but I took my tofu out of the fridge, pressed it for an hour and cut it up, and then started drying it out in the oven. It took at least 2 hours.

** If you've noticed that dinner's are a little plainer than usual this week, it is because I am haing some dental work done and I am not allowed to eat any foods that would stain a white t-shirt: no curry, no tomato sauce, no red wine... etc. It is actually quite limiting.

Dinner in a pinch - Lentil stew

Tonight we were SUPPOSED to have baked tofu coated with herbs, nutritional yeast and cornflakes served with mashed potatoes and steamed kale. We got ready to press the tofu and realized the neither of us picked it up at the grocery yesterday. And, since we were standing in the kitchen in our pajamas, neither of us wanted to go to the store. So, we improvised. We made a lentil stew with kale and served it over mashed potatoes. I always have bags of lentils in the pantry. It came out really well. I didn't measure anything, but it would be hard to screw it up, so here you go:

2 Tbs Olive oil
1.5 - 2 Yukon Gold potatoes, diced (or 1 russet)
2 carrots, sliced (You can also add celery with the carrots if you have it)
1 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic
1/4-1/2 cup white wine, or red wine
1 tsp dried thyme
1/2 tsp dried basil
1/4 - 1/2 tsp dried oregano
1/2 lb Lentils du Puy, brown lentils, or green lentils (NOT red lentils), sorted, rinsed
2 cups vegetable broth
~2 cups water
1 bunch kale, chopped
2 Tbs shoyu, or soy sauce
pepper to taste
salt to taste

Heat olive oil in a large pot over med-high heat. Add potatoes, carrots, garlic, onion to the pot and cook for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. It will probably stick a little bit. After about 5 minutes, deglaze the pot with wine. Add stock, lentils, and enough water to cover, plus about another 1/2 inch. Add the dried herbs, crumbling the thyme between your fingers as you add it to the pot. Bring to a boil and then lower the heat and simmer about 25-30 minutes, partially covered. Stir occasionally and check to ensure there is enough water. When the lentils taste like the are almost done (tender), add the chopped kale. Cook for about 15 minutes. Add shoyu, and pepper. Add salt if necessary. Serve over brown rice or mashed potatoes.

Note that the time will vary slightly depending on which type of lentils you use (check the cooking times on the package). I used the lentils du puy.