Looking for the perfect dish to take pride of place on your Christmas table this year? Well look no further than this sumptuous vegan Christmas pie that’s stuffed with beans, cranberries, nuts and veggies!
Vegan Christmas pie
By The Vegetarian Society (www.vegsoc.org)
Serves 6-8 | Prep 20-30 mins | Cook 1 hr 15 mins | Calories 446 (per serving)
SF DF EF V MF
Ingredients
For the filling:
- 2 onions, peeled, finely chopped
- 130g (4½oz) leeks, finely chopped
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 2 garlic cloves, peeled, crushed
- 225g (8oz) mushrooms, sliced
- 25g (1oz) dried cranberries
- 340g (11½oz) tinned butter beans, chopped
- 250g (9oz) tinned cooked chestnuts, sliced
- 50g (1¾oz) hazelnuts, chopped
- 2 tsp fresh thyme, chopped
- 1 tsp English mustard
- salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
- 1 tbsp cranberry sauce
For the hot water crust pastry:
- 150ml (5½oz) water
- 115g (4oz) vegetable suet
- 330g (11oz) plain white flour
- ½ tsp salt
Method
- Gently fry the onions and leeks in the oil for 5 minutes.
- Add the garlic, 150g (5½oz) mushrooms, the cranberries, butter beans, chestnuts, hazelnuts, thyme and mustard. Continue to cook for 10 minutes – the mixture should be fairly dry. Season with salt and pepper, then add the remaining mushrooms and remove from the heat.
- Preheat the oven to 180ºC/Gas Mark 4.
- Heat the water in a saucepan. When boiled, add the suet and stir vigorously. Remove from the heat.
- Place the flour into a large bowl and stir in the salt. Add the water and suet mixture.
- Carefully gather the mixture into a ball, turn onto a work surface and knead the pastry for 5 minutes.
- Lightly grease a 20cm (8in) loose-bottomed deep pie dish.
- Take three-quarters of the pastry and roll it out. You should not need to dust your work surface with flour. Carefully line your pie dish.
- Spread the cranberry sauce over the pastry base and add your pie filling. Fold excess pastry over towards the centre of the pie. Trim excess pastry, leaving a lip of 3cm.
- Roll out the remaining pastry to make a lid. Place it on the top of your pie, trim the excess pastry, then pinch the two layers of pastry together to seal in the filling. Brush the top with a little soya milk and place in the oven for 1 hour, or until the pastry is golden brown.
- Carefully release the catch on the pie dish and lift onto a serving dish.