Aaron loves it when I cook with wine. Just the smell of the wine de-glazing the goodies off the bottom of the pan is enough to drive him crazy. He is particularly happy when it is something heavily meaty but my most recent mushroom Bourginoin –a very satisfying vegan dish–got a great reaction from him. He called it “Comfort food at its best” and stated that he “didn’t think vegan food could taste so good.” To me, those were great compliments.
As for me, I am a little reluctant about this dish. I am not a huge fan of mushrooms. And, the dark brown gravy doesn’t really look that appealing to me. But, once you try it–you realize that the combination of the flavors, the textures, and the smells really make this dish amazing. It is good enough to serve to any meat eating friends and perfect for those on all sorts of different diets.
I made this during a particularly cold streak down here in Florida–where the highs were in the 60′s and the lows in the 40′s. And, though that doesn’t happen often down here–when it does, it makes all of us want to hibernate and eat good food.
I threw a big helping on top of some pasta and topped that with Tofutti Sour Cream and cilantro. You might want to consider throwing it on some brown rice or maybe even a helping of mashed potatoes. Hmmm.
A great vegan stew, perfect comfort food. Slightly adapted from a recipe by Smitten Kitchen.
Ingredients
- 2 T olive oil
- 2 T Earth Balance (vegan butter or more olive oil will work OK too)
- 2 lbs mushrooms (I used giant Portabella mushrooms)
- 1 small onion, diced
- 2 cloves of garlic
- 1 cup red wine
- 2 cups vegetable broth
- 2 T tomato paste
- 1 tsp thyme
- 1 1/2 T flour
Instructions
- In a medium saucepan, heat up one tablespoon of the olive oil and vegan butter. Add the mushrooms and allow them to heat up but remove them before they start to leak out any juices. Remove them from the pan and set aside.
- In the same pan, heat the other tablespoon of olive oil and add the onion, thyme and about a tablespoon of salt. Cook for about ten minutes, or until the onions are nicely browned. Add the garlic and cook for another minute. (The smells will be fabulous!)
- Next, add the wine to the pan and be sure to scrap up all of that lovely onion and garlic goodness from the bottom of the pan. Increase the temperature and allow to reduce to about half.
- Finally, add in the tomato paste, mushrooms and the broth. Let cook for about 20 minutes.
- At this point, you can mix the flour with the last tablespoon of butter and add that to the stew. This will thicken it up. I missed this step though and it worked out fine.
- Serve atop pasta or rice. Top with sour cream (vegan) and cilantro.