A Portuguese Feast

Phil has continued to predominantly do most of the cooking these days and I am still yet to fully rediscover my enthusiasm for getting creative in the kitchen.  However, in Portugal with the luxury of time and such a beautiful palette of fresh produce to choose from,  I suddenly became totally excited about cooking up a Portuguese feast.  

Despite having spent quite a lot of time in Portugal over the last few years or so, we still don't have a huge amount of experience with Portuguese cuisine (although Phil does make a mean Caldo Verde).  Most of the places where we have eaten out in Portugal haven't tended to include that many traditional Portuguese dishes in a vegan form.  Weirdly the most experience we had was in our very own Cornwall with the now sadly closed down The Sound Pantry in Newlyn.  Run by a Portuguese family, they offered a vegan menu full of traditional dishes.  It was here that we first experienced an à Brás dish. This dish, named after its creator, heralded from an old quarter of Lisbon and traditionally was made from shredded bacalhau (salt cod), potatoes cut into matchsticks, onion, parsley and sometimes olives, all bound together with egg.  We've never had it in Portugal so it was one of the dishes I wanted to make.

I knew that these days, for ease, you can use little potato crisp matchsticks for this recipe. Phil hoovers these up whenever we are over here so I knew I would be on to a winner including them in this recipe, as well as saving all the extra effort of cutting potatoes into little matchsticks and frying them first. These little potato sticks are what The Sound Pantry had used for their version too.  I also knew that à Brás could be made with other 'meats ' too and so with plenty of vegan substitutes over here it wouldn't be difficult to include one in the dish. However, with my usual stock cupboard of flours, herbs and spices 1000 miles away back home, I was wondering what I would use for what I thought was a creamy white sauce (I later realised about the egg in the traditional dish).  I wanted to get the technique right too so thought it best to investigate online and it was then that I happened upon this wonderful vegan recipe from Viva!  As soon as I read the recipe I realised how obvious it was to use silken tofu, which I knew I could get over here easily. The recipe was far less complex and quick than I had imagined in my head too.  I'm glad I looked now instead of trying to busk it!

The Viva! recipe used Fry's Chicken Strips.  We think we had seen them over here possibly but weren't about to go traipsing around trying to find them when we could use what was more to hand.  In the ambient aisle of a local supermarket we found Black Olive Hamburgers, and with the olive theme, I thought this was ideal and it was indeed great.  I have cooked the dish again since and found some frozen Linda McCartney Pulled Chicken strips which worked just as well, if not a little better.

We had our little camping pots of herbs and spices we brought with us but these didn't included turmeric or cayenne pepper as called for in the recipe.  Not wanting to buy these over here, I substituted a little mild curry powder for the turmeric and some chilli flakes for the cayenne pepper and it worked fine.  The only other deviation from the recipe I made was to put the whole mixture in an oven dish and just bake it for about 10-15 minutes or so at the end.  This was mostly because we wanted to chill out and drink another glass of fine Portuguese wine before we ate but we both agreed we felt it added to the dish by slightly crisping off the top.  There is no doubt that this dish will become a firm favourite with us once back home too.  

To accompany the meal I wanted to make a traditional bean stew.  Again, I was going to make this up but after my success at finding the vegan à Brás recipe I thought I'd have a search around for an existing recipe for that too, and bingo, I found one on the Comidamor blog, written by Flor, a Portuguese vegan lady now living in London.  This Portuguese Bean and Cabbage Stew (Feijoada à Transmontana) is kind of like a Portuguese version of a chilli and heralds from Tras os Montes region in the north.  

What was wonderful about finding this recipe is that another very obvious thing hit me that I hadn't really considered.  Cabbage is used loads in Portugal (and by the way always seems to taste sooo much better over here!) and so why wouldn't it be included, (like it is in the traditional Caldo Verde soup), in a stew/chilli.  Again, due to stock cupboard restrictions I had to busk it a little and added some dried mixed herbs instead of the bay leaf and a pinch of mild curry powder instead of the cumin but we did have the paprika with us.  I went the whole hog (excuse the non vegan term) and included the vegan sausage too, which is readily available over here.   I actually downsized the recipe but we still had enough for two more meals.  It is again easy to make, and although takes a little longer than the à Brás recipe, most of it is on the stove top just cooking away doing it's own thing.  This just meant I had more time to drink another glass of wine and prepare a couple of side dishes!

I served the à Brás and stew with a side of lettuce and alfalfa and some beautiful tomatoes sliced and mixed just with a simple drizzle of olive oil and salt and pepper.  Both dishes will be made at home again and I will also be investigating more of Flor's Portuguese recipes on the Comidamor blog, as well as the other Portuguese recipes on the Viva! website.

Comer com gosto!