Vegan Meat Patties

Vegan meat patties

Quite by chance and by accident I have made vegan patties that look and taste like meat. I think I shall have to name them Serendipity Patties. (Btw, hands up who first learned the word serendipity from Dr Who circa 1970?)

Here's how it happened. I went shopping this morning while DD was at school. Included in my weekly shop full of healthy fruit, vegetables and whole grains of course (well mostly - some of the grains aren't wholely whole tbh), were DD's crisps. I came home, unpacked the shopping and sat down at the computer with a cup of tea, to work.

I tried eating a bowl of porridge with banana. Then I finished the cold pasta in the fridge with salad vegetables and a tahina dressing. Then I had another cup of tea. And finally I succumbed to the crisps. (I should have just eaten the crisps first and bypassed all the other calories.) This was over a four hour period but still, I ate her crisps.

DD goes to club straight from school on Friday and one of the leaders comes to the school to walk a group of them over to the club house at 11.45. Yes Stupid Friday school finishes at 11.45. It was my turn to pick her up with her friend, at 1.15. We walked the friend home and then just had time to pop back into the local supermarket for a replacement bag of crisps.

The shops here close at 2pm on Fridays in the winter and don't open at all on Saturday. There was a pile of reduced perishable items by the check out. I was drawn by a designer loaf of bread and a pack of two whole-wheat challah rolls in the 2 for 12 shekels basket. I bought them and the sliced loaf went straight into the freezer for toast. I fancied a challah sandwich for supper.

However, when I took the challot (pl) out of the bag they were dry and sort of crumbled in my hands. I was angry initially but there was nothing I could do about it except resolve never to buy food on offer from that shop again. I've said this before but I keep forgetting.

Ever industrious in the kitchen, I crumbled the challot into a bowl, added a finely chopped onion, a jar of pasta tomato sauce, two tablespoons of nutritional yeast, and a shlug of olive oil. I would have added some soy or Worcester sauce but I didn't have any. I mixed it all up and spooned patty sized mounds of the mixture onto a baking tray. Into the oven for - umm - until they started to smell done, flipped them over and back into the oven for another 10 minutes. Oh yes, the oven was hot  - about 200 degrees.

They were still a bit moist and floppy when I put them onto a plate to cool but became much firmer as they rested. I had about 25 (now only 21) and they really do taste meaty. I think next time I'll make them bigger like burgers.

I packed them into a plastic box and into the fridge for the week. In a prime example of bloggerfail, I'd forgotten to take a photo. So the photo after the fact is not very Martha Stewart but at least I remembered before they were all eaten. Don't they look good for vegan?