Bummer...

[jennyfedei]

Geezzz.. I just had a huge flop today!! I'm a relatively new Vegan so I'm experimenting a bit. Today is Thanksgiving and I thought I would make a Vegan loaf with lentils, brown rice, cranberries, walnuts, sage, garlic, onions & celery. I also added some bread crumbs, tomato sauce and some egg replacer.

It was a total flop... the loaf didn't set up well and turned out more like mush!! Everyone else had turkey, so this was to be my introduction to everyone on my new Vegan menu.

In the past I would have used eggs to hold everything together, but since going Vegan I don't know what to use. The egg replacer didn't work unfortunately.

I really love the above mentioned ingredients... can anyone suggest how to make the same loaf next time, but find a better way to make it set up? Or is there a similar recipe out there that has been tried and true?

Christmas is coming soon and I would like to have something fabulous to take to the family dinner next time. They were not convinced that the Vegan diet offers such good food due to my goof.

The funny part is that I left it on the counter when I got home and found my two cats eating it!!!... The little farts thought it was great!!!

Jenny

[Steph]

Hi Jenny, funny you posted this, as I just copied a recipie for a lentil loaf from some internet site the other day, it got good reviews from people who made it, but I can not attest to how good it is, as I've not yet made it, maybe you should test it before christmas to see if it is as good as they said! (sorry yours turned out mushy, but at least the felines enjoyed it)

Lentil Loaf
Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups lentils
3 1/2 cups water or vegetable broth
2 onions, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
3 tbsp olive oil
2 cups pre-cooked rice
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup ketchup or barbecue sauce
1/2 tsp sage
1/2 tsp Italian seasoning
Preparation:
Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.

In a large soup or stock pot, simmer the lentils in water or vegetable broth until cooked, about 30 minutes. Drain thoroughly then mash the lentils until they are half mashed.

Sautee the onions and garlic in olive oil for 3 to 5 minutes, or until soft.

Combine the onions, garlic and olive oil with the mashed lentils and add the rice, salt, ketchup or barbecue sauce, sage, and Italian seasoning.

Gently press the mixture into a lightly greased loaf pan. Drizzle a bit of extra ketchup on top if desired.

Bake for 1 hour. Allow to cool slightly before serving, as this will help the lentil loaf to firm up.

[jennyfedei]

I will give it a try... I think you're right though.. I need to give these recipes a "test run" before introducing them to family and friends lest they think that Vegans don't know how to eat well. Anyone else out there have any great lentil loaf recipes? Or any good holiday recipes for that matter. Christmas is coming!

Speaking of the little farts.. the lentils are giving them gas!! Lord help me! They will not be sleeping with Mummy tonight!! :p

[harpy]

That's funny about the cats - bet if you made it specially for them they'd turn their noses up though :D

I think the rice in Steph's recipe may serve as glue. As I think we discussed before I sometimes add a tbsp of margarine to things instead of the eggs and that does seem to hold them together a bit, though not as much as eggs do. If you can locate fake cheese that can be cooked and that melts, adding some of that may help too.

ETA if things like loaves don't stick together very well one option is to bake small individual patties/rissoles of the same mixture instead, then you don't have the problem of cutting them up.

Bodges'r'us

[flying plum]

hey jenny :) i used a lentil and nut roast recipe from cherry's website (www.parsleysoup.co.uk) at a thanksgiving the other weekend. it was lovely, though i forgot it was in the oven, and dried it out a bit too much! but if yours was still mush, i would suggest it hadn't been cooked for long enough, and still had too much liquid in it?

i'm going to trial run a walnut and cranberry nutloaf next weekend to prepare for crimbletide - i shall let you know how ti goes!

amanda

[RubyDuby]

I made a very veggie loaf not too long ago that turned out pretty good, but I just winged it and there are a lot of ingredients. I'm sure you could sub your ingredients in place of some that I used though, if you want it to taste like stuffing. :p

preheat 425 degrees

2 c shredded carrot
1 1/2 c tvp reconstituted with 1 1/2 c veg stock (for meaty texture)
2 c broccoli
2 c frozen corn
1 minced onion
3 Tbs flax meal (for omegas- walnuts would be better! mmm)
2/3 c nutritional yeast (for B12 etc)
1 Tbs egg replacer mixed w/ 4 Tbs warm water (for glue0
1 1/3 c vital wheat gluten (for glue)
1/3 c ketchup
1/3 c soy sauce
2/3 c water
1 1/3 c oatmeal (for glue)
Tbs Sage
Tbs Basil
2 Tbs garlic powder
1 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
1/6 c oil
2 c cooked lentils

mix everything together really well. dump it into 2 non-stick loaf pans, cover with foil. Bake 45 min. Uncover and bake 20 more.
wait for it to cool before cutting it and it won't fall apart.


http://i174.photobucket.com/albums/w85/rubyduby2b/food/P1030295-1.jpg

[boatsteem1]

Oh my, you just made me hungry even though I just ate :D



http://i174.photobucket.com/albums/w85/rubyduby2b/food/P1030295-1.jpg

[jennyfedei]

hey jenny :) i used a lentil and nut roast recipe from cherry's website (www.parsleysoup.co.uk (http://www.parsleysoup.co.uk)) at a thanksgiving the other weekend. it was lovely, though i forgot it was in the oven, and dried it out a bit too much! but if yours was still mush, i would suggest it hadn't been cooked for long enough, and still had too much liquid in it?

i'm going to trial run a walnut and cranberry nutloaf next weekend to prepare for crimbletide - i shall let you know how ti goes!

amanda

Thanks Amanda! That's so sweet!! I will definitely be interested in the results. I really like the combination of lentils, brown rice, walnuts & cranberries and bread crumbs with celery, onion & sage... I use to incorporate eggs to hold everything together, but I'll just have to find a better way to get the same results.

Maybe the addition of oatmeal, nutritional yeast and whole wheat flour might help?

I'm on a quest now... I would love to have a nice holiday loaf for Christmas this year. Except, I'm not presenting it to anyone until I have tired it first! That was a huge mistake on my part.

Oh well.. live and learn... :dizzy:

Jenny

[flying plum]

i normally put a spoonful of peanut butter in...seems to work quite well to hold it all together. you could try other nut butters if you didn't want it to be too peanutty? amanda

[VeganMonkey]

i normally put a spoonful of peanut butter in...seems to work quite well to hold it all together. you could try other nut butters if you didn't want it to be too peanutty? amanda

Tahini works well too.... :thumbsup:

[RubyDuby]

nut butters really help it stick? hmmmm. I highly recommend adding the wheat gluten. I works like a charm.

[jennyfedei]

Yum! Those sound like great ideas... I just came from the coop a bit ago and picked up some gluten. Though I would try making some seitan, but I can try it out on the lentil loaf as well.