I like to think that, for the most part, adhering to a vegetarian diet doesn't particularly hinder me in the context of day-to-day eating. The seeds of this were sown when I started at university (now almost SEVEN years ago) and found meat to be prohibitively expensive when I could just use a can of chickpeas or lentils in it's place. I didn't really know an awful lot about cooking then, but I knew that I could throw some vegetables and some kind of pulse together in a pan, season it vaguely and serve it with rice; it worked well enough for the time being. It should come as no surprise that it was during this period of my life that I chose to become a vegetarian.
So, if you ask me now whether vegetarianism restricts me at all, my initial impulse is to say something like "of course not", and claim that meat in a dish can be easily replaced by any other ingredient. However, this isn't exactly true. There are things that meat can do to a dish that the addition of a single vegetable or a bean cannot. I'm taking about the deeply savoury qualities that browned beef and liver gives a pan of bolognese, or the fulsome lick of saline fat that cubed pancetta can afford to a simply dressed bowl of pasta. The qualities that meat bring to food seem so context-dependent, that it makes me wonder why it's used as a default ingredient, rather than with intention.
This sounds like I'm preparing to make the announcement that I'm renouncing my years of vegetarianism in favour of walking the path of the flesh; I'm not. Rather, what I'm (somehow) only just coming to understand is that to be a better vegetarian cook is to understand both it's advantages and it's limits. What this translates to thinking less concretely about what is being replaced in a dish, and reflecting more on the qualities that are to be replicated. Would the meat have added a dose of salt or umami? Does the flavour of the meat carry through to the rest of the dish? Is there a textural element to it's use? I think that beginning to understand this can inspire confidence around meatless cooking. At the same time, these are questions meat eaters should be asking themselves too; if these questions can't be easily answered, then the answer is almost invariably not to use meat.
In the interests of transparency, I do have to disclaim that my vegetarianism does have some small limits. I keep fish and oyster sauce in the kitchen, and will occasionally use a chicken stock cube. On very infrequent occasions (it stands at about once a year, currently) I'll have a meal that uses meat directly; a couple of weeks back, I made Samin Nosrat's recipe for Buttermilk-Marinated Roast Chicken because I wanted to understand the reverential airs that imbue the current literature around a home-cooked roast. I understood, it was a pretty delicious experience, but not one I feel compelled to replicate any time soon. The rest of the time, the food I eat is pretty exclusively meatless.
So, let's go to the source o'the discourse; my mum has informed me, on multiple occasions now, of the existence of a recipe named "Campfire Stew" that she has picked up while discovering camping in her late-fifties. I never went camping when I was younger, but I shall not go into this, lest this blog becomes devoted solely to things I didn't get to do as a kid. Anyway, the aforementioned recipe involves putting a joint of gammon into a slow cooker/casserole dish/clay pot/whatever you choose to use and adding beans, tomatoes, vegetables and other seasonings and cooking until the gammon is tender enough to pull into strips. I'm not sure why she (repeatedly) rhapsodised to me about something so integrally carnivorous, but it stuck around in my mind for enough time for me to want to make a version that was vegetarian friendly.
So, let's think; what is the purpose of gammon? It's salty. It's fatty. It's tender. My mind instantly turned to jackfruit. If you're unfamiliar with jackfruit, I talk about it in more detail here, but it is essentially a fruit that greatly replicates the texture of pulled pork to the extent that the white pulp and flesh respectively resemble a cut of pork with a considerable amount of fat. You can find it in canned form in most major supermarkets across the UK now, as it has gained considerable repute as a meat substitute. However, there is still the matter of taste. Recreating the actual taste of various meats is near enough impossible without some form of costly scientific intervention, but the next best thing would be to consider how the meat would have been seasoned. We often associate pork with smokiness, and a slightly woody sweetness. Here's where I took a tip from wonderhowto.com and used lapsang souchong tea to achieve this flavour blend; if you don't have this, or don't want to buy a box of it then I will leave substitution suggestions below as ever (I'm aware it is somewhat unorthodox).
You may be wondering why I wouldn't just use a meat replacement product here. While I don't have any problems with them, I find that while they come in the format of the thing they're replacing, they don't go particularly far in recreating the qualities of meat discussed above. Plus, they're usually a lot more expensive to buy. But, saying that, I think it is certainly useful that they're so widely available now and have contributed to making vegetarianism and veganism a much more accessible prospect nowadays; I cut my teeth on Quorn mince and "chicken" pieces before discovering the honourable tinned chickpea.
Whatever you choose to do with it, use this as an opportunity to think about the individual qualities of each ingredient, especially if you choose to make substitutions. While I have put this forward as a vegetarian (it's also vegan, btw) alternative to campfire stew, it is still quite vegetable-forward which generally reflects my own tastes. If you would prefer it to be a bit more "meaty" then please see my suggestions below the recipe!
Jackfruit Campfire Stew
Preparation time: 1 hour (not all of this is active)
Cooking time: 45 minutes
Serves 4-6
Ingredients
1 large onion, finely diced
50g celery, finely diced
4 cloves of garlic, crushed and minced
2 red chillies, finely minced
1 green bell pepper, 1/2 diced & 1/2 sliced into 3cm strips
1 yellow bell pepper, sliced into 3cm strips
1 red bell pepper, sliced into 3cm strips
350-400g of butternut squash, cut into 2cm cubes
400g tin of kidney beans, drained
400g tin of chopped tomatoes
1 tbsp of tomato puree
565g tin of jackfruit, drained
100ml of vegetable stock
3 lapsang souchong teabags
1 tbsp of maple syrup
1 tbsp + 1 tsp of light soy sauce
1 tsp dried thyme
1 1/2 tsp of smoked paprika
1 tsp of ground cumin
1/2 tsp of ground coriander
1/2 tsp of ground black pepper
15ml of lemon juice
1 tbsp of vegetable oil
Salt
Method
Put the butternut squash into a bowl and add 1/2 a tbsp of fine salt. Use your hands to distribute this evenly throughout the bowl and let it sit for at least 1 hour. This will allow the salt to properly permeate the dense flesh of the squash.
Brew the lapsang souchong teabags in 200ml of water for 3 minutes before removing. Be careful not to steep the teabags for too long, otherwise the taste will become astringent. Add the maple syrup, 1 tsp of light soy sauce, dried thyme and 1/2 a tsp of smoked paprika and stir until consistently combined.
Drain the jackfruit, and break it down into smaller strips by slicing each piece into cross sections and then slicing again in the other direction; the coarseness of the jackfruit is up to you! Add it into a bowl and pour over the tea mixture. Let this steep for at least 30 minute (you can prepare the other vegetables while waiting for the jackfruit and the squash). Once the jackfruit has finished steeping, drain as much of the liquid as possible into a bowl and set it aside for use later.
Heat a saucepan or a wok to a medium heat, and add vegetable oil. Once the oil has come to temperature, add in the onion, the celery and the diced green bell pepper. Cook on this heat for 6-8 minutes, or until softened. Add in the garlic and the red chilli and cook on a medium heat for a further 1 minute.
Turn the pan up to a medium-high heat and add the peppers, sprinkling over a 1/4 tsp of salt and stirring through. Cook for 4 minutes, stirring frequently. Stir in the butternut squash, cooking for a further 2 minutes.
Stir in the jackfruit and the beans, and cook for another 2 minutes. After this, pour over vegetable stock, the drained tea mixture,chopped tomatoes, lemon juice, tomato puree and 1 tbsp of light soy sauce. Stir this through, before adding the cumin, black pepper, coriander and 1 tsp of smoked paprika. Turn the pan up to a high heat and bring to the boil. Once it has come to the boil, turn down to a medium-low heat and simmer uncovered for 25 minutes.
After 25 minutes, check if any more seasoning is required. Remove a piece of butternut squash and cut through it to ensure that they are cooked through. If so, turn off the heat and leave to cool for 5 minutes before serving.
I walked the path of traditional American comfort here and served this with mashed potato, but rice or polenta would also be good alternatives.
Notes & Adjustments
As stated above, if you can't find jackfruit then you are welcome to use a meat replacement product that comes in a similar format. I would steer clear of products that are already flavoured, and go for a plain one.
If you don't have lapsang souchong tea, there are a few potential alternatives. You could marinate the mixture in vegetable stock instead of the tea, and mix it in with double the amount of smoked paprika. Alternatively, stirring in a tbsp of a particularly smoky variety of barbecue sauce (look for the word "woodsmoke") would work well too, as would using liquid smoke.
If you would prefer this to be more "meat-forward", take out either the red or the yellow pepper and 100g of the butternut squash and double the amount of jackfruit used.
Although I've suggested using kidney beans, any tinned beans will work. Usually I'm more inclined to suggest using dried beans, but I don't think it makes much of a difference with a dish like this.
Instead of the lemon juice, you could use a red wine vinegar. This would a richer, rather than a sharp, fruit acidity.
Comments