Italian Carbonara with ‘Bacon’
A traditional Italian carbonara might be one of the least vegan-friendly dishes, but as this utterly satisfying vegan carbonara recipe proves, anything can be made vegan! It has all the delicious creamy flavours of the original, with smoky vegan bacon giving it a delicious meaty texture and gratifying flavour.
Servings: 2
Servings: 2
Ingredients
Method
Ingredients
(Servings: 2)
- 50 50 g Sgaia Smoky Rashers, chopped into rough little bits
- 2 2 tsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil, divided
- 50 50 g Firm Silken Tofu
- 1 1 tsp Tahini
- 0.5 0.5 tsp Wholegrain Mustard
- 1 1 tsp Soy Sauce
- 0.25 0.25 tsp Ground Turmeric
- 0.5 0.5 Tbsp Nutritional Yeast Flakes
- 25 25 ml Almond Milk
- 80 80 g Dry Pasta
- Sea Salt and Pepper to taste
Method
- First of all, fill your pot with water and add 1 Tbsp coarse sea salt per litre, cover and set over high heat.
- Heat 2 tsp of olive oil and 1tsp soy sauce in the pan over medium heat and, once it’s heated up, add the chopped up rashers. Let them sizzle away, tossing the pan from time to time to ensure they go nice and crispy all over. Set them aside.
- By this time, your water should be boiling. Add the pasta and set your timer for about two minutes less than what’s stated on the package (you’ll be cooking it in the pan a little too, this will avoid the risk of overcooking).
- Mix the tahini, mustard, 1tsp soy sauce, turmeric, nutritional yeast and almond milk in the bowl, stir until combined. Add 50g of the Tofu and mash it in until the mixture is smooth (we used a potato masher). In the same pan you used before, add the remaining 2tsp olive oil, warm it up over medium heat and add the mixture. Let it warm up for a couple of minutes, then crumble the rest of the tofu in roughly with your fingers. Lower the heat and just keep it warm while you wait for the pasta to cook – cover the pan so that the liquid doesn’t evaporate and your sauce doesn’t burn!
- When the timer goes off, drain the pasta in a sieve over the sink and add it to the pan, tossing it to coat the pasta with the ‘egg(less)’ sauce. If it’s very dry, add some water or almond milk. Grind a little pepper over it, cover and let it cook in the mixture for a couple of minutes, or until the pasta reaches your desired al-dente-ness.
- Add the crispy rasher bits to the pan, toss to mix it all in nicely and serve nice and hot, sprinkled with a little extra nutritional yeast if you feel you’re missing out on the Parmigiano.
Find Sgaia’s vegan bacon at www.sgaiafoods.co.uk/products/vegan-bacon-rashers
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