Veggie Irish stew with spelt dumplings
A mouth watering Irish stew, with plant based sausages and fluffy spelt dumplings. This recipe is a great way to use up leftover veg.
Serves [4]
Ingredients
Stew
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
4 plant-based sausages chopped into chunks
Fridge forage vegetables (onions, mushrooms, celery, carrots, leek, garlic are all great), chopped
3 tablespoons flour (plain works well, but whatever you have)
750 millitres of veg stock
1 bottle of beer (ale or stout) (optional)
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1/3 cabbage shredded (or a different vegetable that you have knocking about)
1 medium potato, peeled and diced
1 tablespoon fresh thyme
Spelt Dumplings (optional as you could serve the stew with a slice of buttered bread)
200 grams spelt flour (or breadcrumbs from a stale loaf)
3 tablespoons nutritional yeast flakes
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt and pepper to season
2 tablespoons fresh thyme leaves
200 millilitres oat milk
3 tablespoons olive oil
Method
Add the oil to the pot. When the oil is hot, add the sausages, and fridge foraged veg. Sauté for about 5 minutes, until the veggies begin to soften.
Stir in the flour. Sauté about 2 minutes more, until the flour evenly coats the veggies.
Stir in the beer (if using), stock, tomato paste, cabbage, potato and thyme. Return the mushrooms to the pot. Raise the heat and bring the liquid to a boil. Lower the heat and allow the mixture to simmer, uncovered, for 10 minutes. The veggies should be a bit firm at this point. You can add up to a cup of water during simmering if the broth reduces too much.
If making the dumplings. While the stew simmers, make the dumpling dough. Stir the flour, nutritional yeast, baking powder, salt, thyme and chives together in a medium mixing bowl. Stir in the milk and oil to form a soft and sticky dough. Be careful not to overmix.
After the stew has simmered for 10 minutes, taste test the broth and season it with salt and pepper to taste. If adding dumplings then drop 2-3 tablespoon dollops of the dough into the stew. Make sure you've got plenty of room, as the dumplings will expand as they cook. Cover the pot and lower the heat. Allow to simmer for about 15 minutes more, until the veggies are tender and the dumplings are fluffy. Ladle into bowls and serve.
Food savvy tip
If you are aiming to reduce the amount of meat in your diet, then check out our guide to how to get more plant protein in your diet which includes loads of delicious recipes.
