Happy Friday!

So I panicked last week. I threw a pre-Christmas party in Miami before heading up north to the cold and was freaking out about what to make as the guest list grew. Normally, my dinner parties are intimate and pasta with nutty ‘bolognese’ sauce, hearty mushroom with cashew cream soup, fried rice or homemade veggie hot dogs work well as main courses. Those dishes impress most everyone, even the carnivores. However, this dinner needed to be extra special. My family was in town, some newer friends were coming and we were pulling out all the stops – crystal goblets, flowers, candles, gorgeous table over-looking the water and sparkling lights overhead. The menu had to be more creative in honor of the occasion.

the holiday (vegan) dinner party dilemma

For those of us trying to live a plant-based life, holidays can be especially hard. We want our guests to be happy and impressed with our dishes but we are crammed already (I had 4 people sleeping in my 500 s.f. cottage!) and testing out a new recipe is risky business. Thankfully, there are sooooo many recipes available online and I found several for Mushroom Wellington. I had a few days to experiment and I needed them all. It took me three attempts and many tweaks to get it right but I think it was a home run. I can now in good conscience recommend this dish as a main course at your next dinner party for carnivores, plant-based peeps and everyone in between. It’s ‘meaty’ (thanks to the portobellos), hearty, elegant and delicious. I served it with a mushroom cashew cream sauce (super easy) and simple sides of roasted Brussels sprouts and acorn squash baked with a dollop of maple syrup and bit of Mikoyo’s vegan butter. My lovely friends brought homemade appetizers and more dishes to serve with the Wellington. It was a feast to say the least.

Unfortunately, with all the chaos of preparing the feast, I forgot to take a photo of the final winning Wellington and the side dishes. The main post photo is of one of the Wellington trial runs. The final looked more like the below photo by Delicious Every Day. My friend (and master self-taught chef) suggested I roll out the pastry sheet first so it cooked through. Duh?! She also suggested a Duxelle (kind of like a mushroom pâté) in place of the onions in the original recipe. Both great tips, which made for a tasty final dish.

recipe credit

This Mushroom Wellington is a slightly modified version of the recipe I found on deliciouseveryday.com pictured beautifully left. I need to take a food photography class!

The Duxelle recipe is from vegweb.com. I did not modify anything from that recipe and it took one try to get it right. Duxelle is also good to serve as a pâté with crusty bread. I will definitely make it again.

The cashew cream sauce is my own inspired by Isa Does It. There is no shortage of plant-based recipes online. You just need to like to cook and experiment!

a healthier wellington

This dish, while decadent and fattening considering the pastry, is still a much healthier version of Beef Wellington. It contains mushrooms, onions and spinach, which are 3 of the 6 G-BOMBS foods (greens, beans, onions, mushrooms, berries and seeds) recommended by Dr. Joel Fuhrman to fight breast cancer. So many of us are moving towards a plant-based diet for health, beauty, environmental and moral reasons. Recipes like this makes it easy. I had wanted to make my own puff pastry, which would have made it even healthier. I found recipes online but I was already a bit cray cray with all I needed to do. Next time, next level.

never give up on plant-based eating

I’m glad I stuck it out and stayed with my heart’s desire which was to create a vegan feast worthy of an elegant dinner party. The animals deserve my extra effort. My friend Karin (the same master self-taught chef mentioned earlier) made an insane amount of beautiful desserts including this Apple Pumpkin Cake (made without dairy and eggs) that was moist and absolutely delicious. I’ve said it a million times and I’ll say it again, dairy and eggs are simply not necessary!

If you make this dish or some version of it, let me know. Have a beautiful weekend and please don’t be that neighbor who keeps their Christmas lights up until March. 😉 Below are some somewhat blurry photos that capture the night.

MUSHROOM WELLINGTON

December 29, 2017

by Susie Belanger

Category Recipes

Ingredients

• THE MAIN WELLINGTON
• 4 large portobello mushrooms caps
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 10 ounces baby spinach - about 2 bags
• 4 sprigs of fresh thyme leaves picked off the stem
• 2 sheets of vegan puff pastry (I used Pepperidge Farms, which is surprisingly vegan!)
• 1 tablespoon dijon mustard
• salt and pepper to taste
• VEGAN EGG WASH (to seal pastry edges and give the pastry a golden color)
• 1 tablespoon aquafaba. Aquafaba is the water in the can with the chickpeas and is used for many things including making vegan meringue. (Note: save the chickpeas to throw in a salad later or to make a tuna-ish spread -recipe in blog, query 'tuna-ish')
• 1 tablespoon almond or other non-dairy milk
• 1 tablespoon olive or canola oil
• 1/2 teaspoon maple syrup
• DUXELLE FILLING
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/2 a small onion, peeled and minced fine
• 3 shallots, peeled and minced fine
• 1 pound mushrooms or mushroom stems, cleaned, dried and minced fine (I used button mushrooms)
• 1/2 cup flat-leaf (Italian) parsley, minced fine
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
• 1/2 cup walnut pieces chopped
• CASHEW CREAM SAUCE
• 1 cup cashews soaked for 2-8 hours in spring water and then drained
• 2 cups vegetable broth
• 4 tablespoons cornstarch
• 4 ounces button mushrooms cleaned and sliced thin
• 2 garlic cloves minced fine
• 1-2 tablespoons nutritional yeast
• salt & pepper to taste
• *Organic ingredients are always best. Budget doesn't allow all organic? Google the Dirty Dozen Clean Fifteen to know which vegetables contain the most pesticides and which are mainly pesticide-free. For example, onions are on the 'Clean Fifteen' list and therefore contain a minimal amount pesticides so buying conventional is fine. Spinach is on the 'Dirty Dozen' list so it is recommended that you consume organic spinach. Time to grow that garden!

Instructions

1. If you have not yet soaked your cashews, you need to do that before anything else! Come back once they have soaked at least two hours.
2. Next, read the directions for the pastry to make sure it is defrosted by the time you are ready to assemble and bake your Wellington. Mine took 40 minutes to defrost outside of the refrigerator.
3. Sauté spinach in a large frying pan with 1/2 tablespoon olive oil over low heat until just wilted. Remove from pan and set aside to cool.
4. Increase the heat to medium-high, add the remaining olive oil and place the mushrooms, top side down in the pan. Cook 5-7 minutes, turn over and cook an additional 7 minutes until just golden in color. If you have a huge pan, you can cook all at once, otherwise, cook one or two at a time. Remove from the heat, and drain on dish towels top side up to let them release the liquid. Push down a few times to release as much liquid as possible. Put the spinach and mushrooms in the refrigerator to cool.
5. Next you prepare the Duxelle.
6. Cook onions and shallots over medium-low heat in 2 tablespoons olive oil until translucent (not brown!) - about 10 minutes. Remove from heat.
7. Place the mushrooms and walnuts in the food processor and pulse until just minced. Toss the mushrooms/walnuts mix in with the shallots and onions and return to heat. Cook the mixture down over medium heat, stirring occasionally. The goal is too cook it down until mixture becomes a paste and most of the water has evaporated. You can use a clean dishtowel to push down and soak up any remaining moisture. Watery mushrooms and vegetables will lead to a soggy puff pastry. Add the salt, pepper, and parsley and transfer the Duxelle to the refrigerator to cool.
8. Lightly flour your workspace and use a roller to roll down one sheet of pastry at a time to about 3/4 of the original thickness.
9. Preheat the oven to 390 degrees Fahrenheit. Cut a piece of parchment paper to fit a large baking sheet. You will transfer your 'rolls' there once assembled. If you feel more comfortable, you can assemble your Wellingtons on the baking sheet but it may be a little difficult since we are making two. You are ready to layer with your veg. Lay out one sheet (see diagram below). Spread 25% of the Duxelle first on top of the pastry. Top with 25% of the baby spinach. Spread the dijon mustard over two of the mushrooms, season well with salt and pepper and place the 2 mushrooms on top of the spinach and top with half the fresh thyme leaves. Add another 25% Duxelle then 25% spinach on top. Bring the side and end flaps together and seal at the top, removing anymore than a 1/4 inch of pastry overlap. Turn the roll seam size down and repeat the above steps with the remaining sheet of puff pastry to make your second Wellington.
10. Prepare the vegan wash by whisking everything together in a bowl or glass measuring cup. Spread the wash on top with a brush or your fingers and also use it to seal the pastry seams. Run a knife lightly over the top to make a cross-hatch pattern for added effect. Place your two Wellingtons in the oven and cook for 30 to 35 minutes, or until golden and flakey.
11. While your Wellingtons are in the oven, let's make the cashew cream sauce. In a medium sized sauce pot, lightly sauté garlic for a minute or two in about a tablespoon of oil on medium-low heat then add the mushrooms and cook until golden. Add one cup of vegetable broth and increase the heat to medium.
12. Next, place the drained cashews and 1 cup of vegetable broth in a blender along with the cornstarch and blend the hell out of it. This only takes about a minute in a Vitamix but can take up to 5 minutes in a regular blender. Add the cashew cream to the pot with the vegetable broth and mushrooms and cook for about 7 minutes until sauce is thickened. Add the nutritional yeast flakes at the end.
13. Have the sauce available on the table with a ladle so people can serve themselves.
14. Serve with your perfectly cooked, slightly browned, flakey Mushroom Wellington topped with a few sprigs of fresh thyme.
15. Enjoy!

do it in stages and don’t stress

I realize this dish is a bit complicated with lots of steps. Since I literally forgot to take pictures of everything, I’ve included a diagram here for the pastry assembly.

You can make the Duxelle and Cashew Cream Sauce the day before and sauté the portobellos and spinach first thing in the morning. Also, I chose sides that wereeasy to prepare and pop in the oven. Next time I will remind myself not to stress as I did in preparation for this dinner. In the end it turned out great and we had a lovely time as we normally do. I get by with a little (more than a little) help from my friends – and wine.

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