Vegan Haggis

It’s Robert Burns’ birthday, so for a VEGAN HAGGIS tonight, I offer my version of one I found online last year for the big event. Served with champit tatties and bashed neeps (mashed potatoes and mashed turnips or rutabagas) and some greens, this makes for a festive meal. 

 

You can also serve a cock-a-leekie soup first (potato and leek soup), which I did last year. But this year I think I’ll keep it simple. Not that Haggis is simple — it’s sort of a hodge-podge of a dish any way you make it. If you are at all squeamish, I think you will like this kind better than the unmentionable version.

Ingredients

½ cup — fine oatmeal (or grind it)

2/3 cup — brown or green lentils

1 lg — chopped onion

1 Tblsp. — olive oil

2 lg — grated carrots

1 cup — sliced mushrooms (I used soaked shiitake slices)

1 tsp — mixed ground spices (I used cumin, turmeric, paprika, and allspice)

1 Tblsp. — tamari

1 can — drained kidney beans (I used some of my home-canned kidney beans, and a can of aduki beans — but the kidney beans look more interesting in the final product)

2 cloves — finely minced garlic cloves

Salt and black pepper to taste

1 cup — ground-up walnuts

Method

Soak the oatmeal in a bowl of water until you are ready for it. Cook lentils in 4 cups water for 20-30 minutes or until soft. Drain. Soak the mushrooms if they aren’t fresh. (I put mine in with the lentils, but then they disappeared under them in the cooking — and you want to be able to sauté them, if possible.)

 

Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.

Saute the onion in the oil until soft. Add the grated carrots and the soft mushrooms and cook a bit longer. Add the spices, tamari, drained cooked lentils, and half of the kidney beans. Blend the rest of the kidney beans (or aduki beans). I threw the walnuts in the blender, too, though you could grind them separately if you want. 

Mix the blended beans and walnuts in with the vegetable/lentils, and add drained soaked oatmeal, salt and pepper, and the garlic. Mix it all up together and press it into a greased oven baking dish. I mounded mine up. Bake for 30-40 minutes.

Carry the vegan haggis to the table with great pomp to the sound of bagpipes.