Bethany's Vegan Kitchen

Meatless meatballs in a homemade tomato sauce, served inside a soft white baguette. Some vegan meatballs are rather depressing little things, that tend to turn to mush at the slightest touch. Not these meatballs. These are dense and have quite a meaty mouthfeel due to using seitan. A definite mush-free zone.

Yield; Four servings (541kcal per serving) Cook time; 1 hour

You’ll need;

For the meatballs;

1. 200g/7oz vital wheat gluten
2. 40g/1.5oz chickpea flour
3. 30g/1oz nutritional yeast
4. One tablespoon of the following; sage, onion powder, garlic powder and smoked paprika
5. One teaspoon of fennel seeds crushed
6. 300ml hot water
7. 60ml soy sauce
8. One tablespoon of tomato puree
9. One tablespoon of fish free worcestershire sauce

Method;

• Add the dry ingredients to a mixing bowl and mix well. Do the same with the wet ingredients
• Next, add the wet ingredients to the dry and mix well until a dough forms. Knead the dough for three minutes to activate the gluten
• Divide the dough equally into 12 pieces. Roll each piece into a ball, then wrap each ball in either foil, food safe cling film, muslin or cheesecloth (you may have to tie off each ball depending on what you used to wrap them in)
• Place the balls in a large pan of boiling water, immediately lower the heat to low, cover with a lid and leave to cook for around 20-30 minutes
• Once cooked, remove from the heat, unwrap and leave to cool

Next, move on to making the tomato sauce

You’ll need;

1. One tablespoon of non-dairy margarine
2. Three cloves of garlic, minced
3. One tablespoon of tomato puree
4. One 400g/14oz tin of chopped tomatoes (blended with a blender/food processor until smooth)
5. One teaspoon of the following dried herbs; parsley, oregano and basil
6. 15g grated non-dairy parmesan cheese
7. Salt and black pepper to taste
8. You will also need two small baguettes. I used two bake at home baguettes

Method;

• In a small saucepan over a medium heat, melt the non-dairy margarine. Once melted, add the garlic and cook for one minute
• Next add the tomato puree, cook for a minutes before adding the chopped tomato, herbs and parmesan. Season to taste with salt and black pepper, place the cooked meatballs in the sauce and leave to simmer for 10 minutes
• Then simply slice open the baguettes, spoon in the meatballs and sauce, then serve