Au gratin is a method of baking vegetables or meat with breadcrumbs and cheese on top. This is a delicious dish but needs milk and cheese which has no place in my pantry nowadays. I have made the original au gratin with cheese and milk using potatoes and other vegetables earlier and it turned out beautiful. My husband used to love it. And why not. It was so creamy and tasty with all that cheese and milk. I was checking out some recipes in 'Eating healthy' when I came across broccoli au gratin using tofu and milk. I removed the milk from the recipe and used silken tofu instead and it became Vegan au gratin ! I tried it a few days back and was gratified when my hubby tasted it and thought that I had forgotten his diet restrictions. What a thought! As if I could forget! Now to the recipe.
Vegan Au gratin (Ref [1])
Ingredients
1 - large potato cut into small cubes
1 - large or 2 small carrots cut lengthwise
2 - tomatoes cut lengthwise or small pieces
200 g - Silken tofu (Mori-nu brand)
2 pcs - Whole wheat bread
1/2 tsp - Organo
1/2 tsp - Basil
1/2 tsp - Extra light olive oil for greasing the baking dish
1 cup - soy milk or water
1 bunch - fresh coriander
Salt & Pepper for seasoning
Method
1. Blend Silken tofu with water or soy milk to bring it to a sauce consistency. Add herbs, salt and pepper and keep it aside.
2. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees C for 10 min.
3. Steam all vegetables in the pressure cooker for 5-6 whistles or in a steam basket in the microwave oven for 6 min.
4. In a greased baking dish (use the 1/2 tsp extra light olive oil), place a portion of the steamed vegetables.
5. Pour the tofu sauce over the vegetables making sure all of them are covered in the sauce. Place the rest of the vegetables over this in a layer and pour rest of the sauce. Add some fresh coriander and some dried herbs and seasoning.
6. Then cut the bread into pieces (you could also crumble the bread for a finer layer) and place over the sauce and veggie mixture, so that it is a layer on top of the dish.
7. Keep the dish in the oven for 20 min or till the bread layer becomes brown.
8. After it has cooled down a bit, serve it with a chunky tomato dip.
Chunky tomato dip (Ref [2])
Ingredients
5 - large tomatoes
1 bunch - fresh coriander
1 tbsp - vinegar (I used apple cider vinegar)
1/2 tsp - Extra light olive oil
Salt & pepper for seasoning
Method
1. Remove all seeds from the tomatoes. Blend 3 in a mixie and cut the rest into small cubes.
2. In a small pan or kadai add the olive oil
3. Add the tomato puree and the pieces
4. After 5 min, add the fresh coriander, the vinegar and then season it with some salt and pepper
You could blend onions along with the tomato as was given in the original recipe, but I preferred it this way.This dip is quite refreshing and goes well with the au gratin. Almost no oil and no dairy and really wholesome to the boot.
References
[1] Eating healthy cook book - Edwin Keister,Jr
[2] The best ever vegetarian cookbook - Linda Fraser
