Can I Call it Stroganoff?

Yesterday was kind of a special day at work.  We had our first annual Harvestfest, one of those potluck-type events that comes in abundance around the holidays.  Those events that you ponder over for a few minutes, wondering exactly how 'all-in' you should go.  Should you dig up a nice fancy recipe designed to impress, or take it easy and pick up something on the way?

This time around I decided to use our potluck as an opportunity to experiment with one of my mother's favorite recipes - perhaps one of the most non-vegan recipes that she made, but also one of my favorites.  Yup, the one that got requested every birthday from elementary school up through college.

Beef stroganoff.  I don't claim to know any of the history behind the dish - wikipedia tells me that it is a Russian dish.  (I didn't know I had any Russian in me, perhaps I should start using family recipes to trace back my ethnicity!)  More specifically, a Russian dish made of sauteed pieces of beef in a creamy sour cream sauce.

Beef.  

Cream.  

Very, very non-vegan!

However, I got to thinking that the beef is not at all what I love about this dish.  In fact, even at a young age I'd pick out the more sinewy pieces as I did not like the texture.  What I did love was the amazing flavor from the onions, mushrooms, and spices, that were used to enhance the dish.  I also loved the creamy sauce, and thought that there must be a way to reproduce this without having to use dairy.

Below is the recipe that I used for our potluck, and I'll have to say that I got amazing reviews!  (I smile inside when even those omnivores among us say that one of the vegan dishes was their favorite :) ).  I used all 'real' ingredients- meaning no substitute things, no fake meat, etc- with the exception of vegan sour cream.  In the future I think I will try to come up with a better substitute, but the brand I found was a surprisingly good rendition of sour cream.  Also, quick and easy.

I hope that you find this as enjoyable as I did!

(Note : I was in mass production mode.  You probably want to cut this down to half for a family-sized dish.)

Vegan Mushroom Stroganoff

Ingredients:  

3 Tbsp oil

2 Tbsp garlic

2 large onions

4 10-oz cartons mushrooms (your choice of variety)

2 peppers (I used one red bell, one large italian green)

1/2 cup soy sauce

1/8 cup VEGAN worcestershire sauce

1/4 cup kitchen bouquet (or gravy master)

1 Tbsp black pepper

3 Tbsp flour

8 oz. vegan sour cream

Directions:

1. Same as usual :).  For those of you who have been reading my recipes, you know that they pretty much all start out the same way!  

In a large saucepan, add enough oil to thinly cover the bottom of the pan.  Add garlic and chopped onion. Cook over medium heat until onions are clear.

2. While onions are cooking, chop up the mushrooms and peppers.  Stroganoff doesn't usually have peppers - my replacement for the beef was to use extra onions/mushrooms and add a few peppers for variety.  You will notice however that mushrooms become the featured element.

Add the mushrooms and peppers to the pan, in addition to the black pepper.  Continue to allow the vegetables to cook over medium heat until they become soft (about 20 minutes).  If you find that your dish is more watery, you will choose to leave the pan uncovered.  If not, then cover the pan so that the veggies cook faster and maintain the liquid.

3.  Next, add the soy sauce, worcestershire sauce, and kitchen bouquet.  Notice that the kitchen bouquet is what gives the dish its dark brown coloring.  Stir and continue cooking over medium heat.

4.  At this point, because of all of the vegetables and sauces you added, you will probably have a good amount of liquid in your pan.  In order to make a nice thick sauce for the dish, we add a small amount of flour.  Stir in the flour, turn heat down to low, and allow to simmer until the sauce becomes nice and thick.  At this point, it's also a good idea to turn your oven on (375) to start heating up.

5.  Once the sauce has become thick, remove your pan from the heat.  Stir in your sour cream (this is about half of a 16-oz container), or 2 'dollops'.  The color should turn from dark brown to a light brown color.  You can add more or less sour cream at this point depending on desired creaminess.




6.  I forgot to take a picture of the last step!  After adding the sour cream, pour your stroganoff into a baking dish (I used 13x9 for this larger quantity).  Bake at 375 for about half hour, stirring every 10 minutes.  The goal of this step is to further thicken the consistency.  I have found that without the meat though, this step can be totally skipped if you are short on time and/or enjoy the more creamy texture.

7.  Time to eat!  My mom always used to serve this dish with potatoes and cranberry sauce, so I admit I am partial to that solution.  However, wikipedia also tells me that the more common preparation involves serving over noodles.  Either way, delicious!  Enjoy!





Here's some of the less common ingredients that I used, kitchen bouquet and vegan sour cream :