Vegan Spagetti Bolognese
All the comforts of childhood – without the meat! I love spaghetti bolognese, and I really missed it when I stopped eating red meat. Luckily after some experimenting, I found that the basic principles of making a delicious beef mince, can be applied to vegan mince – and it’s just as delicious!
Notes
Serves 3-4, about 1.5 hours
Here in the US, I use https://www.beyondmeat.com/en-US/products/beyond-beef as my beef mince substitute, because it’s gluten free, and the most similar to the ‘real thing’ I’ve found! Feel free to use your preferred brand, it should work all the same as long as the quantity is similar.
Ingredients You’ll Need
- One medium onion, chopped
- 4 cloves of garlic, chopped
- 12oz beyond mince
- 1 cup chopped celery
- 1 cup of grated carrot
- fresh thyme, I like to throw in a good 8-10 stalks
- 1 cup fresh chopped parsley
- 1/2 tspn salt, few grinds of black pepper
- 1 flat tbsp sugar (I only use brown or raw sugar in my home, but use whatever you have)
- 1/2 fresh squeezed lemon
- olive oil – about 2 tablespoons
- 1 heaped teaspoon tomato paste
- Spaghetti or linguine (I always go for gluten free)
- 1 vegetarian stock cube
- 12oz tin of chopped/diced tomatoes
- 1L boiling water
Vegan Spagetti Bolognese
- Total Time: 1 hour 30 minutes
- Yield: 3-4 1x
Description
Vegan Spagetti Bolognese
Ingredients
Scale
- One medium onion, chopped
- 4 cloves of garlic, chopped
- 12oz beyond mince
- 1 cup chopped celery
- 1 cup of grated carrot
- fresh thyme, I like to throw in a good 8-10 stalks
- 1 cup fresh chopped parsley
- 1/2 tspn salt, few grinds of black pepper
- 1 flat tbsp sugar (I only use brown or raw sugar in my home, but use whatever you have)
- 1/2 fresh squeezed lemon
- olive oil – about 2 tablespoons
- 1 heaped teaspoon tomato paste
- Spaghetti or linguine (I always go for gluten free)
- 1 vegetarian stock cube
- 12oz tin of chopped/diced tomatoes
- 1L boiling water
Instructions
- Start by getting all of your ingredients out and ready in front of you, with a chopping board and a sharp knife!
- Pop a medium size pot onto the stove and set the temp to a low/medium heat. Chop the onions and add these to the pot with the olive oil, and fry for about 10-12 mins. I like to cook onions low and slow until they get gold and sweet – some things should not be rushed!
- While the onions are slowly doing their thing (give them a stir every few minutes), chop the celery, the garlic, and grate the carrot.
- Add the celery to the pot, and let this fry for a further 5-7 mins or so, then the grated carrot, thyme and garlic, stirring for a further 3-4 minutes.
- Now for the mince. Remove your onion mixture from the pot into a bowl, and add a dash more olive oil, turning up the heat to med-high. While the pot heats up, get your water boiling in the kettle. Place your mince into the heated pot and mash it up, string every 1-2 minutes getting a nice browning while it cooks. After about 5-6 minutes, return your onion mixture to the pot, and stir everything together.
- Add your tin tomato (don’t throw away the tin), sugar, tomato paste, fresh chopped parsley, and squeeze in the lemon.
- Take the tin and fill it with about 3/4 cup of boiling water (be careful, the tin gets hot), add the stock cube, and swoosh around to get all the remaining juices and add this to your pot! Your mince will be quite liquidly at this point, don’t worry, it will reduce!
- Bring to the boil, and then reduce the heat to low and let this simmer for about 40-50 mins, stirring every 8-10 mins. Of course, if you want the mince to have less liquid and to be thicker, you can simmer for longer, reducing further!
- About 15 minutes before your mince is due to be ready, get your pasta on the boil, following the timing on the packaging. When it’s ready, drain it from the hot water and set aside, it shouldn’t be too soft where the spaghetti breaks when you move it.
- Once the mince is ready, remove from the heat and give the sauce a taste – feel free to adjust flavors with more salt, lemon, sugar, etc. Once you’re happy with the flavor, remove all the sprigs of thyme.
- Dish the spaghetti and and mince, topping with fresh parsley. Enjoy as is, keeping it vegan, or add some grated parmesan which is always a delicious treat!
- Cook Time: 90
- Category: Lunch/Dinner
- Method: Stovetop
Anonymous
This was really delicious!
Anonymous
Randy
I don’t see any mince in the ingredients…
Administrator
Thanks for spotting this!! I have updated the recipe 🙂