Bastille Day 2011: Seitan Roulade, Petite Pomme de Terre, Ratatouille, Haricot Verts, Blini with Vegan Caviar, Tapenade, Mushroom & Walnut Pate

Bastille Day 2011 7/16

Seitan Roulade

Petite Pomme de Terre

Ratatouille

Haricot Verts

Blini with Vegan Caviar

Tapenade

Mushroom & Walnut Pate

Dessert

Chocolate and Coconut Milk Ganache Tart with Sea Salt

We had our annual Bastille Day party, sharing many of our favorite dishes with our friends Anna & Phil and Laura & John.



The Seitan Roulade was the focal point of the main plate. Shown here after the seitan was seared with the addition of the collard greens and mushrooms. It was finished by rolling and trussing the seitan with twine and then baked for 15 minutes at 350F. Surprisingly, after watching the seitan video so many times while editing it, I still had to go back and look at the broth amounts. ;)

(Also, 1100+ views on the video so far? Wow!)

Rounding out the plate were Petite Pomme de Terre, Haricot Verts and Ratatouille -- which we smoked the eggplant and zucchini for 15 minute in cherry wood. Here's the rest of the recipe.

Ratatouille

2 tbs. olive oil
1 medium onion, sliced
2 garlic cloves, minced
salt and pepper to taste
1 tsp. herbes de provence
1 medium eggplant, diced
2 medium zucchini, diced
2 tbs. nutritional yeast
3-4 medium tomatoes, roughly diced
2 tbs. parsley, chopped

In a large saute pan, heat the 1 tbs. olive oil and lightly brown the sliced onions. Add the garlic for the last two minutes, along with the salt, pepper and herbes de provence.

While that's cooking, in a separate large saute pan (or wok), add the additional 1 tbs. of olive oil and the diced eggplant, diced zucchini, and cook until lightly browned.

Combine the eggplant and zucchini with the onions and garlic back into the pan and sprinkle the nutritional yeast over all of the ingredients, stir to incorporate, and cook for a couple of minutes.

Turn the heat down to low, add the diced tomatoes, stir to incorporate. Cook until thickened -- about 10-15 minutes, stirring occasionally. The final result should look fairly stew-like. Add the chopped parsley, check for seasoning.

At this point it's ready to eat -- or you can put the ratatouille in an au gratin dish, sprinkle a little extra nutritional yeast on top and bake it at 350F for 15 minutes to firm it all up.







We started with apps: Tapenade, Blini with Vegan Caviar (recipe) and Mushroom and Walnut Pate.

Mushroom and Walnut Pate

1 tbs. olive oil
1 small onion, diced
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 tbs. fresh thyme
salt & pepper

1 tbs. olive oil
1 tbs. Earth Balance
2 cups of mushrooms, sliced
salt & pepper

2 tbs. sherry
1/2 cup walnuts, toasted
1/2 tsp. lemon juice

In a large saute pan over medium-low heat add the olive oil and onion and slowly cook until it's deeply caramelized (but not burnt) about 15 to 20 minutes. Just before it's finished add the garlic and cook for one additional minute. Remove from the pan and set aside.

While the onion and garlic is cooking, add the olive oil and Earth Balance to a wok (or large saute pan) over med-high heat. Add the mushrooms along with a pinch of salt and pepper. Cook until the mushrooms release all of their liquid, about 10 minutes. Add the sherry, stir to combine and cook for one additional minute. Remove from the wok and add to the onions. Let cool 10 minutes.

In a vita-mix or high speed blender, add the mushrooms, onions and garlic, (toasted) walnuts, lemon juice, 1/2 tsp of salt and pepper and puree until smooth -- you might need to do it in batches depending on how big your container is. Check for seasoning.




For dessert, Liz made the Chocolate and Coconut Milk Ganache Tart with Sea Salt -- I didn't get a picture because there wasn't anything left to shoot seconds after serving it, so here's what it looked like when we made it last time. ;)

Tags: bastille day, seitan, eggplant, potatoes, ratatouille, tapenade, pate, walnut, mushroom, caviar, blini, recipe, vegan, food, dinner, tofu666