Vegan Pap Tert

• Tempeh Bacon Stuff Ingredients
  • 250 g tempeh
  • 15 ml (1 tbsp) liquid smoke
  • 15 ml (1 tbsp) soy sauce
  • 15 ml (1 tbsp) maple syrup
  • 1/4 tsp cumin powder
  • 1 heaped tbsp rice flour (only if deep frying)

• Sauce Ingredients
  • 15 ml (1 tbsp) olive oil
  • 1 medium onion, diced
  • 2 cloves garlic, minced
  • 200 g sliced button mushrooms
  • 80 ml (1/3 cup) red wine
  • 1 tsp dried basil
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1/2 tsp sugar
  • 1/4 tsp cumin powder
  • 400 g tin of chopped tomatoes
  • 2 tbsp tomato paste

• Polenta Ingredients
  • 900 ml (3 3/4 cups) vegetable stock
  • 1/4 heaped tsp cumin powder
  • 1/4 heaped tsp dried thyme
  • 225 g (1 1/2 cups) polenta flour
  • 1-2 cups melty vegan cheese for topping

• Directions/Method
  1. Grease a medium casserole dish and preheat the oven to 160 degrees Celsius (325 F).
  2. First prepare the tempeh. You’ve got two options: deep fry or steam (I opt for the former). If you’re going down the steaming route, steam the tempeh for ten minutes and then crumble or cut into small dice. Mix the rest of the tempeh bacon ingredients together (except the rice flour – omit that unless deep frying) and pour over the tempeh, mixing through.
  3. If you’re going down the deep fry route, do the same as above but you can skip the steaming. Also be sure to add in the rice flour (it makes the tempeh crispier and appears to soak up a tad less oil). Heat a couple of inches of oil to medium high and fry the tempeh in batches until golden brown. Remove with a metal mesh spoon and allow to drain on kitchen roll.
  4. Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan and sauté the onion and garlic over medium heat for about 5 minutes, after the onions get a little transparent but before stuff starts burning. Add the mushrooms and cook another minute before chucking in the wine, basil, salt, sugar, and cumin. After a minute or so most of the wine will have disappeared, and that’s your cue to stir in the tinned tomatoes and paste. Simmer for 15 minutes, or until the sauce has thickened quite a bit.
  5. Moving on to the polenta, add the cumin and thyme to the stock in a medium saucepan and heat to somewhere around medium. Whisk in the polenta flour and continue to whisk until it thickens. You can switch to a wooden spoon if it’s doing your wrists in (and it will because this is a thick polenta).
  6. Visually divide the polenta into three portions and spread 1/3 in the bottom of the casserole dish. Use the back of a wet spoon to help spread it out if it’s too clumpy and solid. Spoon half of the tempeh bacon bits over and half of the sauce, followed by another layer of polenta. Repeat with the remaining tempeh and sauce and tuck it in with that final 1/3 of the polenta on top.
  7. Cover with the vegan cheese and pop in the oven for half an hour. Leave it to sit for ten minutes before serving (not really. I just feel like a responsible grown up saying that, but seriously. Who actually waits?)

Tempeh Lancashire Hotpot

• Ingredients
  • 500 ml vegetable broth, divided into 200ml and 300ml portions
  • 100 ml red wine
  • 1 teaspoon ground coriander
  • 1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon vegetable or groundnut (peanut) oil
  • 200g tempeh, cut into 1/2 inch cubes
  • 1 tablespoon vegan worcestershire
  • 1 tablespoon tamari
  • 2 teaspoon Natex (or other yeast extract)
  • 1 teaspoon dried thyme
  • 1/4 teaspoon mustard powder or 1/2 teaspoon prepared hot mustard
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 100 g (about 1 cup) thinly sliced onion
  • 150 g (about 1.5 cups) peeled and sliced carrot
  • 1 tablespoon flour
  • Enough floury (such as King Edward) potatoes, peeled and cut into 1/4 inch slices, to cover surface of your chosen oven dish
  • Salt and freshly grated black pepper

• Directions/Method
  1. Preheat the oven to 140 degrees celcius (285 F).
  2. Combine the 300 ml portion of broth, yeast extract, worcestershire, tamari, and thyme in a bowl and set aside.
  3. Add the 200 ml broth and wine to a large frying or saute pan, and add the tempeh, coriander, and bay leaf. Simmer at medium-high for 10-12 minutes, or until most (not necessarily all) liquid has cooked off. Agitate the pan from time to time and/or spoon some of the broth over the tempeh pieces as they won’t be fully submerged.
  4. Remove the tempeh pieces with a slotted spoon or spatula and place on a plate. Pour any remaining juices into a 7 x 10 inch oven dish (or something vaguely that size). You can add a bit of extra broth, water, or wine to deglaze the pan if you’d like- just add it all to the oven dish, including the bay leaf.
  5. Don’t turn the heat off. Just rinse the pan and add the tablespoon of oil and pop back on the hob. Re-add the tempeh pieces and carefully fry all sides until browned. They’ll be darkly coloured with wine so it may be hard to spot the browning, but the tempeh will turn a deep, rich red. Once browned on all (or most) sides, after 5-7 minutes, use the spatula or slotted spoon to remove to the oven dish.
  6. Turn the heat down the medium and add the 1 teaspoon of oil. Tip the onion and carrot in and fry until the onion are translucent and the veg are beginning to brown, about 6-8 minutes. Add the flour and stir to coat the vegetables relatively evenly. Pour in the liquid ingredients from step two and whisk to mix well (a few small lumps are okay). Cook until the gravy begins to thicken, whisking or stirring often. You may need to turn the heat up a little to achieve this.
  7. Pour the gravy with veg over the tempeh. Top the casserole with an overlapping tightly knot layer of potato slices. Spray or brush with some extra oil, cover with a lid or foil, and bake for two hours.
  8. After two hours, remove the dish from the oven and ditch the lid or foil. Up the oven heat to 200 C (400 F) and once the oven has preheated to this, stick the hotpot back in there for 40-50 minutes. You’ll know when dinner is ready when the potatoes are brown and crispy.

Steamed Tempeh Balls in Sticky Tamarind Sauce

Makes 18-20 balls, enough to serve two

• Tempeh ball ingredients
  • 170g (6 oz) tempeh
  • 30g (1/4 cup) finely diced onion
  • 1 tablespoon freshly grated ginger
  • 2-3 cloves garlic
  • 2 teaspoons lime juice
  • 2 teaspoons tapioca flour/starch
  • 1 tablespoon soy sauce (or tamari for gluten free)
  • 1 teaspoon palm sugar (or brown sugar)
  • 1 teaspoon ground coriander
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • fresh diced chilies, to taste (optional- start small, kids)
  • 40g (1/4 cup) brown rice flour

• Stir-fry ingredients
  • 1 shallot, sliced
  • 2 cloves garlic
  • 2 teaspoons soy sauce or tamari
  • 1 teaspoon tamarind concentrate + 2 tablespoons water
  • 1 tablespoon sweet freedom or agave nectar
  • 1 heaping teaspoon freshly grated ginger
  • 1 teaspoon fresh lime juice
  • 1/2 teaspoon cornflour
  • 1 teaspoon groundnut (peanut) oil, for frying
  • 1 small onion, halved and cut into wedges
  • About 85g (approx 1 cup) broccoli pieces
  • A handful of sliced spring onion

• Directions/Method
  1. First thing’s first: get the tempeh balls steaming. Cut the tempeh into thin slices and steam it for 10 or 15 minutes in a basket or bamboo steamer. This will help remove some bitterness and also prep the tempeh to receive and soak up the rest of the ingredients. Top up the water and keep the steamer steaming.
  2. Add the tempeh and the rest of the tempeh ball ingredients, except the rice flour, into a food processor and pulse until you have a smooth paste (a few unblended beans won’t put a spanner in the works).
  3. Knead the rice flour into the dough until smooth, and roll lumps in between your palms to form approximate one inch balls. Like in other areas of life size isn’t of the utmost importance, but here the recipe should yield 18-20 tempeh spheres.
  4. If you have tiered bamboo steamers (the cheap ones that stack as many as your ceiling is high), grab three. Line them either with greased plates or greaseproof paper and arrange the tempeh balls at 1-2 inch intervals. Stack and steam for 30 minutes. A metal steamer basket works as well, of course.
  5. Now’s the time to make the sauce! Pound the shallot, garlic, soy sauce, tamarind and water, sweetener, ginger, and lime juice together in a pestle and mortar until you achieve a nice smooth paste. Add the cornflour and stir it all up. If you don’t have a pestle and mortar, a coffee mill is good substitute. Otherwise just mince the garlic and shallot as finely as possible and stir together with the soy sauce, tamarind mixture, sweetener, and ginger in a small bowl.
  6. Once the tempeh balls finish steaming, leave them to cool for at least ten minutes (they’ll be a little sticky at first, but will harden as their temperature decreases).
  7. Heat the groundnut oil in your wok to medium high and stir fry the tempeh balls until the outsides are lightly browned, for around 2 minutes. A little bit of burn is okay, so don’t fret. Add the broccoli and onion wedges, continuing to cook for another 2-3 minutes. Add half of the spring onion along with the sauce, tossing quickly for 1-2 minutes in the wok to combine and finish cooking everything.
  8. Dish up with the rest of the spring onion clumped on top as a garnish.

Griddled Tempeh and Khmer Curry Paste in Banana Leaves

• Ingredients
  • 200g pack of tempeh, cut in half and then sliced through the centre of each piece (to make two thinner cakes of the same length and width)
  • 3 tbsp kroeung paste
  • 2 tbsp soy sauce + 1/2 cup water
  • 2 tsp sugar
  • 2 tsp lime juice
  • Fresh banana leaves
  • A little oil (more for the benefit of your pan than this dish)

• Directions/Method
  1. Mix the sugar, lime, soy sauce, and water in a pain. Add the tempeh pieces and turn the heat to medium. Cook until about half of the liquid is gone before flipping the tempeh pieces and cooking until the pan is nearly dry. Remove from the heat.
  2. Cut 4 pieces of banana leaf to a size a little larger than what you’d need to wrap the tempeh slices as if they were a gift. Lay a piece of tempeh in the centre of each sheet and spoon about two teaspoons of the curry paste on top of each slice, spreading it to cover the whole piece.
  3. Fold the banana leaf first over the longest edges of the tempeh, and then the shortest. Place the parcels on a grill pan with the wrapped side down (once it cooks a bit, they won’t quite bind closed but they’ll remain sealed).
  4. Fry for around 10 minutes on each side. My suggestion is to open a parcel and have a taste halfway through- if the curry paste flavour is still too strong for you then cook a little while longer.
  5. Serve hot with rice or a simple stir fry and a selection of condiments (soy sauce, lime, sugar, chili sauce, etc…).

Vegan Tempeh Kibbeh

• Ingredients
  • 100g bulghur wheat
  • 200g tempeh
  • 1 small onion, finely chopped (about 65g)
  • 1 tbsp tomato paste
  • 2 tbsp (ish) water (may not need)
  • 1/2 tsp sumac
  • 1/2 tsp cumin
  • 1/4 tsp cinnamon
  • 1/8 tsp nutmeg
  • salt and pepper to taste
  • approx 2 tbsp olive oil to coat
  • Fresh lemon wedges to serve

• Directions/Method
  1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees celcius (that’s about 350 F).
  2. First rinse the bulgur wheat and drain. In a food processor, blend the tempeh, bulgur wheat, diced onion, and tomato paste. Add water as necessary. Some brands of tempeh are dry while others are fairly gooey. You are looking for a paste that sticks together and can be kneaded.
  3. Add all of the spices to the mix and blend again.
  4. To make the kibbeh torpedo shape form a few tablespoons into an approximate golf ball shape (a tip to keep the mix from sticking is to keep a small bowl of cold water at hand and keep your palms damp). Roll into an oval shape. Don’t worry if you aren’t able to perfect the torpedo shape (they’ll still taste good).
  5. Oil a baking sheet and likewise coat each kibbeh with a healthy sheen of olive oil. Bake for about 30-35 minute or until the shell is crisp. It’s advisable to turn the kibbeh during cooking, but be careful when doing so (use a spatula to avoid bits sticking to the sheet).
  6. Remove from oven and serve either immediately or cold, with salads, or with any number of mezze dishes. Be sure to include a few wedges of freshly sliced lemon to squeeze onto each bite (really, it’s not the same without)!

Pomegranate Roasted Tempeh

• Ingredients
  • 1.5 tbsp pomegranate molasses
  • 1 tbsp lemon juice
  • 1 tbsp white wine vinegar
  • 1/2 tbsp tomato paste
  • 2 tbsp hot water
  • 1/4 tbsp sugar
  • 1 tbsp Olive oil
  • 225g (8 ounces) tempeh

• Directions/Method
  1. Pre-heat the oven to 200 celcius (400 F) and lightly grease a roasting sheet.
  2. Mix all of the ingredients together, save the tempeh. Cut the tempeh into thin 1/3 inch slices and place in the marinade until most of the liquid is soaked up. This won’t take long (tempeh doesn’t need to soak for a billion years like tofu- it takes in liquid flavour pretty much instantly).
  3. Arrange the tempeh pieces on your oven tray and place in the oven for a total of around 20 minutes, turning each slice over after 10-12 minutes.
  4. Remove from oven and serve hot with salads, couscous, bulgur wheat, steamed or roasted veggies (tip: slice some butternut squash into 1/2 inch strips and roast with the tempeh), or whatever takes you fancy!)

Roasted Red Pepper and Pomegranate Salad

• Roasted Tomatoes
  • 300g cherry or plum tomatoes
  • 1.5 tbsp olive oil
  • 1.5 tbsp balsamic vinegar
  • Splash of liquid smoke (optional)

• Lemon and Olive Oil Vinaigrette
  • 2 tbsp olive oil
  • 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
  • 1 tbsp lemon juice
  • 1 clove garlic
  • 1/8 tsp mustard powder
  • 1/4 tsp agave nectar
  • 1/2 tsp fresh herbs (basil, thyme, rosemary, etc…)
  • Salt and pepper, to taste

• Roasted Vegetables
  • 200g Courgette/zucchini, cut into 1 inch chunks
  • 170g Onion, cut in large chunks
  • 1/2 tsp dried rosemary
  • 1 tbsp Olive Oil

• Tempeh
  • 150g Tempeh
  • 2 tbsp Soy Sauce
  • 1 tbsp lemon juice
  • 1 clove garlic
  • 1/2 tsp dried oregano
  • Olive oil for frying

• Salad
  • Several clumps of your favourite salad leaves. You know, enough for two people sort of thing.

• Directions/Method
  1. Heat the oven to 200 degrees celcius.
  2. Put the tomatoes in to roast first as they could take up to an hour. Simply mix the tomatoes with the oil, vinegar, and liquid smoke (if using) and pop in the oven (remember to put them in some sort of roasting container before placing them in the oven). Set your timer for about 45 minutes, but this is dependent on the size of the tomatoes and how gooey or burnt you like them. I like them to be quite well done, so keep that in mind with your own times.
  3. While the tomatoes are roasting, prepare the dressing. With a pestle and mortar, pound the garlic with the olive oil and salt until you have a smooth paste. Add the remaining ingredients, stir, and place in the fridge until ready to use. Note: you could use a blender of some form for this, but it’s a very small amount of liquid so keep that in mind.
  4. Now to prepare the other veggies for roasting. For the courgette, cut into thick 1 inch slices. If it’s a fat courgette, cut lengthways down its centre first so you have 1 inch halved slices. Make sure your chunks of onion are also relatively large (to keep them from burning to a crisp). Generally I will slice one half of an onion once or twice in line with the root, and then again across the middle if it’s a large onion.
  5. Mix the courgette and onion chunks with the rosemary and olive oil and pop in the oven for the last 25 minutes of the tomato cooking time. If these are finished before the tomatoes, however, that’s fine. They’re quite nice a little cooler as it’s a salad and all.
  6. The tempeh should begin its preparation about ten minutes before you’re ready to serve the meal. Begin by pounding the garlic so its juices are exposed, and mix with the lemon juice, soy sauce, and oregano. Heat a grill pan to a relatively hot temperature (this is always hard for me to gauge because I’m one of those unlucky folk who have to cook on electric) with plenty of olive oil for frying. Slice your tempeh into 4 triangles and dip each one into the broth to coat and then place immediately on the griddle (or, if you don’t have one, a frying pan). Fry on each side for about 3-5 minutes, or until crispy and golden grill lines are visible.