Vegetarian and vegan seasonal Easter feasts: Part One: Starters
Following the rather huge success in December of my Vegetarian Christmas Dinner post, I thought I’d do an Easter one.
We don’t really have any traditional Easter meals, as some families do. Quite often, it’s just an ordinary day, with the addition of extra chocolate. This year we’ll be going to my mum’s for Easter Sunday and celebrating her birthday (which is actually the day after) at the same time. The Easter bunny will probably leave some eggs there. Who knows whether or not he’ll (she’ll?) leave some here, too, so I won’t actually be making this Easter feast on the day. Instead, I’m creating the components over the next few days, photographing them and then posting the recipes and other suggestions here for you, in case you have vegetarians or vegans to cater for at Easter, or just want to try something different.
I thought, rather than make some big heavy pie like at Christmas, it would be great to make use of lots of the vegetables that are in season in the UK at the moment. I have come up with two menus (one vegetarian and one vegan, though of course the vegetarians can eat the vegan dishes too), though I will be adapting them according to what is actually in the greengrocers or on the market stalls at the moment (we have two greengrocers in town, as well as an organic and non-organic market stall on Fridays and Saturdays and a farmers’ market on Saturday, so there’s lots of choice, including plenty of local produce). For example, I did have broad beans in my menu, but couldn’t find any, so swapped them (in that instance) for spring greens. Fortunately, the asparagus has come in, though it’s still pretty expensive, as I have plans for that for the main course.
Over the next few days I’ll be publishing three posts – one for starters, one for main courses and one for desserts. Each post will contain two dishes – one vegetarian and one vegan, often using some of the same ingredients or components, so you could do a combined meal for vegetarians and vegans – along with some suggestions for adapting the dishes and some other suggestions for seasonable vegetarian and vegan dishes.
Vegetarian Seasonal Easter Starter: Beetroot and courgette cream roulade
Beetroot roulade with a creamy courgette filling, served with a rocket and watercress garnish and spring green and mint pesto balls
Ingredients
1 egg yolk
2 egg whites
Watercress and rocket for garnishing
Spring green and mint pesto balls
Method
Whip up the egg whites until they form soft peaks. Mix the egg yolk in with the beetroot puree and then gradually fold in the egg whites.
Line a swiss roll tin with baking parchment and oil the parchment.
Place the beetroot and egg mixture in the tin and bake for about 15 minutes at 180°C/350°F/Gas mark 4.
Leave to cool for a few minutes, but not too long, otherwise the parchment may be too stuck.
Place the courgette filling on top of the beetroot base, leaving about 2 inches around the edges.
Roll up (lengthwise – i.e. to make a thinner longer roll, rather than fatter shorter one).
Place on a plate (don’t make the mistake I did and place on a wooden chopping board, as you’ll then have a very stained chopping board!) and cool until you want to plate up your starters.
When ready to plate up, place some of the watercress and rocket on plates, cut slices of the roulade – I cut two slices and placed them together to make a circle – and place them on the plate along with one or two of the spring green and mint pesto balls. You may well manage a much more attractive plating up than me!
Adaptations
Instead of the spring green and mint balls, you could use a runnier pesto and drizzle it round. Or you could use a fruity sauce instead – strawberry or rhubarb puree, for example.
Vegan Seasonal Easter Starter: Carrot, beetroot and spring green tower
Carrot tower with beetroot puree and spring green and mint pesto layers, served with watercress and rocket garnish and spring green and mint pesto balls
Ingredients
2 large carrots
Spring green and mint pesto
Watercress and rocket for garnishing
Spring green and mint pesto balls
Method
Boil or steam your carrots (or you could roast them).
Cut the peel off, so the carrot is roughly square (yes, mine weren’t quite square, but I’m sure you can do better).
Slice into really quite thin slices (maybe 1.5mm).
Create towers with three filling layers (or you could make them taller if you like), with alternating fillings – beetroot puree, and spring green and mint pesto.
Place in fridge (and cover, if you can without knocking the towers over) to cool until you’re ready to plate up.
When you’re ready to plate up, place the towers on plates with rocket and watercress garnish and spring green and mint pesto balls.
Adaptations
You could add some other layers in, too, such as butter bean and garlic hummus, tomato and nut puree.
Instead of very small and tall towers, you could use more carrots and create layered bricks, just with one of each layer. Why not experiment with different shapes and sizes and see what you like best.
Instead of the spring green and mint pesto balls, you could use a more liquid pesto and drizzle it artistically round the towers.
Components for the starters:
Beetroot puree (vegan)
Ingredients
3 large beetroots
1 tbsp olive oil
½ tsp sea salt
Method
Peel the beetroot and chop into large chunks.
Place in oven dish and pour over olive oil.
Stir well to coat thoroughly with olive oil.
Sprinkle on salt.
Roast in oven for 45 minutes at 180°C/350°F/Gas mark 4, stirring every 15 minutes. (Don’t worry if it burns a bit at the edges, as this adds to the flavour, though if you’d rather not, then cook for longer at a lower temperature.)
Allow to cool.
Puree – I just used my handheld liquidiser, but you could do it in a food processor, liquidiser or even just push through a sieve.
Adaptations
You could leave the salt out. You could add sugar (or honey or agave syrup) to make is sweeter. You could add spices – cumin goes quite well with beetroot.
Spring green and mint pesto (balls) (vegan)
Ingredients
2 bunches spring greens
5 sprigs fresh mint
1 handful sunflower seeds
Olive oil as required (probably about 2 tbsp)
Method
Strip the leaves from the stalk and cut out the central tougher stalk (not essential, but it’s more bitter than the rest).
Chop the leaves up roughly and rinse under the tap.
Place in a saucepan with a lid and heat for a couple of minutes until the leaves are wilted.
Run under cold water and squeeze out.
Allow to cool.
Strip the leaves off the sprigs of mint and add these to spring greens.
Add the sunflower seeds.
Puree – I just used my handheld liquidiser, but you could do it in a food processor, liquidiser or even just push through a sieve.
Gradually add the olive oil until you have the consistency you want – for the purposes of the recipes on this page, you want a thickish pesto that you can roll into balls, but if you want to use it as a sauce for pasta or a dipping sauce, then add more olive oil.
If you’re making the pesto balls, roll into small balls, place on a plate, cover and refrigerate until you need them.
Adaptations
You could use pine nuts instead of sunflower seeds – or other seeds or nuts. For a non-vegan version, you could add Parmesan (or a vegetarian alternative– Bookhams sell one online) or Pecorino. Or spice it up with some chilli!
Creamy courgette filling (vegetarian)
Ingredients
2 onions
½ tbsp olive oil
2 large courgettes
250g mascarpone
50g Parmesan (or vegetarian alternative – Bookhams sell one online)
Method
Peel and finely dice the onions then soften them in the olive oil on a low heat.
Meanwhile, grate the courgette.
Add the courgette to the onion and cook on a low heat for 10–15 minutes.
Turn the heat off and stir in the mascarpone and the cheese.
Leave to cool until ready to use.
Adaptations
You can use lots of different types of cream cheese – ricotta, soft goats cheese, even Philadelphia. You could also try different cheeses instead of Parmesan – Pecorino, hard goats cheese, etc.
This filling can be used in many other ways – for example, as a layer in a lasagne, as a filling for pancakes and as a sauce for pasta.
Other suggestions for starters
Vegetarian seasonal starters
Broad bean and mint blinis with creamy asparagus sauce
Asparagus and pecorino ravioli with olive oil and parsley dressing
Leek tartlets with pea pesto
Vegan seasonal starters
Watercress soup
Carrot and parsley soup
Butter bean and mint hummus with oat crisps
Come back over the next few days for the main course and dessert posts and if you have any other suggestions for vegetarian and vegan seasonal Easter starters, please feel free to leave a comment.
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