Vegetarian Sausage | 3 bean, lentil & mushroom sausage

Posted on by gloriouslygoodfood

This vegetarian sausage is really quick and easy to make

I’ve recently started  making a lot of different sausages and when my vegetarian friends asked me to come up with some vegetarian sausage recipes, I decided to take up the challenge!

My first one was the sweet potato, caramelised onion and sundried tomato sausage with a chilli kick, but I also really fancied doing something with beans and lentils as they are so tasty, nutritious and versatile.

Note: These vegetarian sausages can also be made into vegetarian burgers / patties without the vegetarian sausage casings.  Simply shape into a burger / patty and fry with a little oil in a non-stick pan.

Vegetarian Sausage | 3 bean lentil mushroom sausage
Vegetarian sausage in vegetarian / vegan sausage casings, ready to ‘cook’

 

Ingredients for 8 vegetarian sausages (these quantities will make 7-8 vegetarian sausages, plus whatever is left in the sausage-making funnel/mechanism)

  • 250g closed cup chestnut mushrooms, cleaned, finely sliced and then coarsely chopped
  • 3 large cloves garlic, finely chopped
  • 50g lightly salted butter
  • 115g tinned butter beans in water, drained (typically from a 250g – undrained weight – tin)
  • 115g tinned cannellini beans in water, drained
  • 115g tinned kidney beans in water, drained
  • 115g ready-to-eat Puy Lentils (I use Merchant Gourmet ones)
  • fine sea salt (to taste)
  • Vegetarian / Vegan Sausage casings (I found these online – available from various retailers)

Method

vegetarian sausages
finely sliced then roughly chopped closed cup chestnut mushrooms in the pan with butter and garlic

Melt the butter in a non-stick pan

Gently fry the garlic on a low heat (do not let it brown, merely soften a little and infuse the butter with garlic flavour)

Add the mushrooms, season lightly with a little sea salt, turn up the heat and cook on a high heat until they are cooked and some of the juices have reduced down – but do retain a little bit of liquid

Meanwhile, ‘blitz’ the butter beans, cannelini beans and kidney beans in a food processor but only very briefly, so as to retain some chunky texture

Add the Puy lentils to the bean mixture and mix by hand

Add the fried mushrooms

If the mixture is a little dry, add a bit of melted butter

Season with sea salt (to taste)

vegetarian sausage mixture
vegetarian sausage mixture ready to go into vegetarian / vegan sausage casings

Push the mixture into the vegetarian sausage casings using a sausage-making machine/funnel (note that when you twist the ends, unlike with natural casings, they won’t remain properly twisted…leave enough room at the end to allow for a bit of expansion of the contents during cooking and prevent all the filling from escaping from the ends)

Grill or fry (careful if you BBQ – the vegetarian sausage casings have a tendency to tear open / explode on the high heat!) and serve with accompaniments of your choice

Vegetarian Sausage – Gloriously Simple, Gloriously Good!

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Lemon Cheese | Lemon Curd

Posted on by gloriouslygoodfood

I adore lemon cheese (or lemon curd…it goes by both names)!

I also cherish lime cheese and, recently, tried someone’s Baileys Cheese and it was heavenly.

How to make these heavenly delights is something that’s always intrigued me, so I looked up the recipe and was stunned to find out how quick and easy it is to make.  I’ve not created my own recipe because, frankly, why mess with perfection?

So I followed Delia’s recipe last night and it took about 10 mins to cook with just a few mins beforehand to grate the lemon zest, squeeze the lemons for juice and get my other ingredients ready!

You can follow Delia’s recipe by clicking the link above.

Here’s the end result of my endeavours:

Lemon Cheese | Lemon Curd

A couple of points to bear in mind:

It ends up looking lighter once it’s cold

It goes a lot thicker as it cools down, so make sure you don’t thicken it to your final desired consistency in the cooking process – leave it a bit runnier

Now…for my next ones, I have a few ideas…

Marsala Cheese (Edit 5th May 2013: I’ve now made Tiramisù Cheese: A spread made with espresso, Marsala all’Uovo and cocoa!)

Strawberry & Champagne Cheese

and I’ll have to make some Lime Cheese, too, as I love it so much 🙂

Father’s Day | Perfect Scrambled Eggs | Fathers’ Day Breakfast

Posted on by gloriouslygoodfood

It will be father’s day on Sunday June 17th in the UK.  Are you ready?  Do you have your dad’s present sorted out, or have you taken your kids shopping for their dad’s present(s)?

I’ve been giving some thought to what would make a great Father’s Day meal and I thought that it’s not just women that enjoy a special breakfast, especially if their partner and/or kids bring it to them in bed as a special treat!

So that got me thinking about what would make a breakfast truly special, and I immediately thought about delicious juicy scrambled eggs, scrambled in oodles of butter and topped with smoked salmon & dill.  Scrumptious!

Scrambled Eggs with Smoked Salmon & Dill - image
For one portion, you will need: 
  • 2 large free-range eggs
  • ca. 40g of Scottish smoked salmon, chopped
  • 20g lightly-salted butter
  • a good pinch/handful of finely chopped dill, to taste
  • sea salt, to taste
  • freshly-ground black pepper, to taste
Preparation / Method

The eggs literally take SECONDS to scramble, so make sure you have everything else ready, including a plate to serve them on, your chopped salmon & dill and any toast you might be serving the scrambled eggs with!

Crack the eggs into a bowl and lightly season with salt & pepper, to taste.  Whisk them with a fork, not a lot, just enough to break up the yolks.  Over-worked eggs  are not nice to eat!

Place the butter in a small non-stick frying pan.  Turn the heat on high and as soon as the butter starts sizzling, pour in the eggs.  Keep the heat on high and keep stirring with a wooden spoon/spatula so that you don’t end up with an omelette.  The process will literally take about 20 seconds, depending on how moist you like your scrambled eggs (I think they’re best served really juicy and barely cooked!).  Remember they’ll keep cooking once you turn off the heat as the pan will still be hot, so get them out of the pan and onto a plate as quickly as possible!

Place the scrambled eggs onto a plate, top with chopped smoked salmon & chopped dill, sprinkle on some more freshly-ground black pepper, to taste, and serve with your (or your dad’s/husband’s/boyfriend’s) favourite buttered toast.

This is not a recipe for the calorie-conscious, but then dads are allowed a day of indulgence at least once a year, aren’t they? 😉

 

Mmmmmm – Gloriously Simple, Gloriously Good!

Scrambled Eggs with Smoked Salmon & Dill
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