I suppose I should have put this Beet Wellington recipe out before Xmas, but I only discovered it the other day, thanks to James Martin‘s Saturday TV show. He calls it a Beet Pithivier (no I have never heard that word before either) but it is a good vegan version of the traditional Beef Wellington.
It is not a particularly difficult recipe, but it is time consuming, in that all the ingredients need some form of pre cooking or preparation. On the good side, most of this can be done the day before and kept in the fridge, and it becomes a matter of assembling and then baking the final product.
Basically the beet wellington is made up of layers of spinach, carrot, mushroom duxelles and onion puree, around a beet, wrapped in pastry.
This recipe makes 4 mini Beet Wellingtons.
1 – Making the Duxelles
Ingredients:
- 300 grms mushrooms
- 1 red onion or 2 shallots
- 2 x 1T vegan butter
- 1 t dried thyme
- salt and pepper
- 1/4 C white wine or vermouth
What to do:
Coarse chop the mushrooms and then blitz in the food processor till fine. Don’t over process or you will have a paste!
Peal and dice the onion or shallots.
Heat 1 T butter in a pan. Add the mushrooms, onions, thyme and a little salt and pepper.
Cook slowly, stirring frequently. The mushrooms will release quite a bit of water. Cook till all water evaporated.
Add the other T butter, and when , melted, add in the wine and cook, stirring occasionally, till the liquid has evaporated.
Set aside and allow to cool.
2 – Make the Onion Puree
Ingredients:
- 2 white onions
- 2 cloves garlic
- 1 T dried thyme
- 3 bay leaves
- salt and pepper
- 1/4 C veg stock
- 2 T organic brown sugar
What to do:
Peel and coarse chop the onions.
Fine chop the garlic.
Add onions, garlic, thyme, bay leaves, salt and pepper to a pot and a little stock. You don’t want it too wet. You can add a little liquid if necessary when you blitz it.
Bring to boil and then simmer gently till onions really soft.
Remove from heat, remove the bay leaves and allow to cool.
Once cool, put in blender with the sugar and blitz till smooth.
3 – The vegetables
Ingredients:
4 large spinach leaves, or about 2 handfuls baby spinach leaves
5 medium carrots
4 medium beets
What to do:
Briefly blanch the spinach leaves till they are soft.
Boil or steam the carrots till just soft, drain, cool and thinly slice.
Trim the beets and steam till soft. Make sure they are properly cooked, or use store bought cooked ones.
4 – Assembling the Beet Wellingtons
Ingredients:
- 4 sheets ready made puff pastry
- The spinach, carrots and beets
- The mushroom duxelles and onion puree
What to do:
You will need some cups or small bowls, lined with cling film or foil, just to help hold the shape while assembling.
Make a layer of spinach leaves in the bowls.
Add a layer of carrot slices.
Spoon in some mushroom duxelles and press up the sides.
Do the same with some onion puree.
Add in the beets and press down gently.
Roll out the pastry and cut appropriate size circles. Carefully turn out each assembly.
Rub a little water on the exposed pastry. Then take a slightly larger circle of pastry and carefully place over the top. Press down gently all round the edges to seal. Yo can make some decorative score marks in the pastry if you like.
You can freeze these for baking later if necessary.
To bake – preheat oven to 200 deg C. Preheat the baking tray as well! This will help the base cook properly.
Lightly coat the wellingtons with soy milk.
Place the wellingtons on baking parchment on the baking tray and bake for about 25 mins till browned.
To serve – cut the wellingtons in half, and dish up with roast veg and either some of the onion puree or a brown gravy.
Bon Apetit!
