Scottish Saturday the Second

Last week for Scottish Saturday I made Mince & Tatties, a regular meal in my house whilst I was growing up, and this week we have another classic from my childhood - Kedgeree. In case you haven't heard of kedgeree it's a curry powder spiced rice dish made with flaked fish, butter, parsley and hard boiled eggs...so, not the most vegan thing in the world! It used to be a favourite of mine though and I haven't eaten it since I moved out of my childhood home about 13 years ago.

Apparently the origins of this dish are debatable, some say that it originated in India, some insist that it's Scottish. Despite being a Scot myself I'm inclined to believe the former!

I took inspiration for my version of this dish from a whole lotta places. Firstly I remembered that I'd bookmarked Liz's recipe from a Vegan MoFo post back in '09 and from there I looked at the very fishy recipe she used as a jumping off point. I also checked out Tami's Food Network Friday post over at her blog Vegan Appetite.


Unlike either of Liz or Tami's recipes I decided to use a vegetarian fish product to replace the real fish in this classic British recipe. I have no beef with mock meat products of any kind, I used to love eating fish before I realised how cruel it was and I liked how realistic this was. Nick didn't entirely agree, he actually used to hate both the taste and texture of faux fish so he wasn't quite as into this as I was! I coated the non-nori side of the fish in a mixture of 1TB olive oil, 1 tsp Soy Sauce, 1 tsp Liquid Smoke and 1/4 tsp Smoked Paprika before pulling it apart and frying it in a little olive oil spray until it browned nicely.

For the eggs I took Tami's idea of using tofu and ran with it. I often make McVegans for breakfast at the weekends using this recipe and I used the apple cider vinegar, olive oil & salt marinade from there to coat the tofu before baking for 15 minutes flipping halfway. To make them kinda egg like in shape I used a tablespoon but I'm sure that this is entirely unnecessary, cubed tofu would be fine but if you have a melon baller this is quite fun! I would like to work on this part of the recipe a little more next time as I wasn't entirely satisfied with its eggyness. I forgot to add any black salt despite jotting it down on the piece of paper I had in the kitchen and I would also like to try to create a yolk using The Vegg.

Ingredients:

• 180g Vegetarian Cod (prepared as above)
• 150g Tofu (prepared as above)
• 1 TBS Margarine (I used Vitalite, you can use something else but it can't be low fat!)
• 1/2 an Onion, diced
• 1/2 Cup Basmati Rice
• 1 1/8 Cups Water
• 1/2 tsp Curry Powder 
• 1/3 Cup Frozen Peas
• 1 TBS Parsley, chopped
• Salt & Black Pepper to taste

Recipe:

• Preheat the oven to Gas Mark 5 / 190C / 375F
• Prepare the tofu (as above)
• Marinade the fish (as above) 
• Melt half of the margarine in a saucepan, add onion & cook on a low heat until softened.
• Add rice and curry powder and stir for two minutes
• Pour in the water, bring to the boil, reduce heat & simmer covered for 8 minutes. 
• Whilst you're simmering the rice pull apart & fry the fish (see above)
• Stir in the fish and peas, cover and simmer for about 5 more minutes checking occasionally that the rice isn't sticking, if it is stir in a little more water
• Remove from the heat, dot the rice with the remaining margarine & let stand for 4 minutes
• Add the tofu, parsley, salt & pepper. Stir, taste, and adjust seasoning as necessary
• Serve with lemon wedges and mango chutney if that's how you roll (it was not how my family rolled so no mango chutney here!)