Vegan Cauliflower Bolognese-ish!!

Prep Time: 15m | Cook Time: 30m | Servings: 7-8

Ingredients

• 2 tbsp oil
• 600g mushrooms
• 1/2 head of large cauliflower (500g)
• 2 cans lentils, drained
• 2 onions
• 1 carrot
• 2 sprigs fresh rosemary
• 1 tsp dried thyme
• 1/2 tsp dried marjoram
• 1/4 tsp ground sage
• 1 tbsp minced garlic
• 1 tbsp veggie stock powder
• 1/2 water
• 1 tbsp sugar
• 1 tsp pepper
• 2 tbsp soy sauce
• 1 cup red wine
• 1100g pasta sauce

Cashew Cream

• 1 cup of roasted cashews (soaked in boiling water for 30 mins then drained)
• 1 tbsp ‘beef’ style veggie stock/broth powder (or equivalent bouillon cubes/granules to make 4 cups stock/broth)
• 1 cup water

To Serve

• cashew parmesan
• cooked pasta, use gluten-free if needed

Instructions

PREPARATION

Soaked your cashews? If you haven’t done that, do that. Good.

Prep all the vegetables. Finely chop onions and peel and chop the carrot. Roughly chop rosemary.

Now to make our vegetable ‘mince’! In a food processor, roughly chop all the mushrooms until it coarse and mealy (took me about 10 secs). Do the same with the cauliflower (took about 5 seconds!) - you don’t want cauliflower rice.

COOKING THE SAUCE

Heat 2 tbsp of oil in a LARGE pot and add the onions and carrot once the oil is hot. Cook for 4-5 minutes on medium heat or until onions are soft.

Add the chopped rosemary, marjoram, thyme, sage, garlic and veggie stock powder.

Stir for about a minute or two to bring out some of the yummy flavours - should start smelling good!

Add the mushroom and cauliflower ‘mince’, water and cook for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. The mix will decrease in size/volume as you keep cooking.

Add the wine, soy sauce, pepper and sugar and cook for a few more minutes. (It may look very watery and kinda just… grey at this point but that’s very normal and okay haha).

Add lentils and pasta sauce. Stir everything until well combined and cook for about 15 minutes, stirring every few minutes or so. A lot of liquid is going to evaporate in this time, but even if you notice quite a bit of of liquid settling once you stop stirring, that’s still okay! The cashew cream will tie everything together.

CASHEW CREAM

Drain the cashews if they’re still soaking. Blend cashews, water and veggie stock powder until very smooth! (about a minute!)

MAKE IT CREAMY

Pour cashew cream into the mix and stir to combine. Cook for another 5 minutes.

Serve with cooked pasta!