A while ago I allowed temptation and pretty pictures to get the better of me, and I purchased Lynda Stoner’s book “Now Vegan”. It is a beautifully laid out book, and although there are not pictures for every single recipe, the spacious formatting makes even the text look delicious. My one major criticism of the recipes is that many of them contain “substitutes” – vegan cheese, fake meat and so forth – products which I consider a bit dubious. Some of them are edible but pretty void of nutrition; others are just plain dirty. But they don’t represent major ingredients in the recipes, and most of the meals in this book are glorious.
The “Autumn Pasta” jumped out at me when I was looking for something coconutty – I’ve never tried miso before, so I thought it would be a fun one to try. I ditched the pasta and used home-made coconut pastry cases instead. I also changed her “1 tablespoon” of cashew paste to “1/2 cup” of cashew paste – this was a mistake due to my previously stated idiocy and ineptitude. However, I think it worked out better this way; it made the sauce thicker and therefore more appropriate as a pastry filling.
Coconut, Miso & Other Stuff Pastry Thingies
- 400ml coconut cream (happily exactly one can of the organic variety I buy)
- Cup of Cashews
- Cup of (soy) milk
- 1 dessertspoon Miso paste
- 1 dessertspoon balsamic vinegar
- 2 dessertspoons sesame oil
- Clove chopped garlic
- Small onion
- Cup of mushrooms
- Lots of fresh basil
- Chilli, to taste
not cooked yet!
- Cook the onion, chilli, garlic and mushroom in the sesame oil on a gentle heat until everything has shrunk and softened and smells delicious.
- Meanwhile, make cashew paste by combining your milk and the cashews in a food processor.
- Add the cashew paste and other liquids to the mushrooms and stir. The miso I used was a hard block so it took a long time and a lot of stirring for it to dissolve into the mixture.
- Lastly add big handfuls of shredded basil.
- 1 can of coconut cream
- No-Egg (a powdered egg substitute)
- 2 cups Flour
- Put the can of coconut cream into the fridge. The idea is for the cream to solidify and become as hard as possible. When the cream is ready, it should be the consistency of margarine. There will probably be a layer of this cream in the can, and beneath that the watery juice.
- Use clean hands to scoop out just the harder cream, and rub this into the flour to make a bread-crum consistency.
- The “no-egg” stuff is usually made with water; use the left over coconut juices instead. Combine this with the flower mixture and stir into a bowl. You’ll have to start using your hands after a while. If you need more liquid use more coconut cream or water. The dough should only just be keeping together at this stage, so don’t add too much liquid.
- Knead on a clean floured surface for a few minutes (5 maybe?) until it is smooth and pastry like. Because the consistency of the coconut is key, if your hands are warm, you’ll probably need to do all this in steps, returning the mixture to the fridge periodically to keep the cream cold. I only had to use the fridge once, because our kitchen is in Canberra.
- Roll out the pastry with a rolling pin – make it as thick or thin as you like – and cut it into circles. Mould these circles into a greased muffin tin.
- Cook on 200 degrees for about ten minutes to harden the shells up – check them, however, to prevent them over cooking. Remove the cases from the tin and allow them to cool a bit.
For the final part of this concoction, spoon the sauce into your cases, put them on a tray, sprinkle desiccated coconut on top, and zap them in the oven. I used 200 degrees for ten minutes then 150 degrees for a further fifteen, but it depends on your oven – you basically just want to heat up and crisp your goodies.
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