Meatballs in Sauce
1 (14 ounce) tube vegan ground beef (I use Lightlife Gimme Lean ground beef)
1/3 cup plain breadcrumbs
1/4 cup safflower oil and extra for sautéing
1/4 cup dried Italian seasoning
2 teaspoons salt and pepper
2 tablespoons garlic powder
1 tablespoon chives
3 tablespoons tamari
2 tablespoons vegan Worcestershire sauce
1 tablespoon liquid smoke
1 (28 ounce) jar marinara sauce
1. Add all ingredients except sauce to large bowl, and mix together. Form 1 1/2" balls.
2. Saute in oil 10 minutes. Combine meat balls and marinara in a crock pot and allow to simmer on low for 3 hours.
These came out so good my husband was feeling like he was eating meat and was a bit turned off! So, if you are a vegan/vegetarian that doesn't like fake meat, this is not the recipe for you.
SO HOW'D IT GO?
vegan worcestirshire sauce is easily available in healthfood shops, so you could try that.
Worcestershire sauce isn't vegetarian :/ It has anchovies in it.
PLEASE don't follow this recipe as written!
This recipe is extremely overseasoned. My wife and I made these meatballs and each put about a third of the batch on a sub roll with a little marinara sauce and a slice of mozzarella cheese. We cut out the 2 teaspoons of salt that are called for because we thought it looked excessive; it's a good thing we did or these would have been inedible. If you make this batch as directed and prepare the meatball subs like we did, you're looking at 4430mg (!) of sodium per sandwich. The way we made them, there was still more than a day's worth of salt in each sandwich. Gross.
I would suggest omitting the salt entirely, cutting the pepper and Italian seasoning in half, and reducing the tamari to 1 or 1.5 tablespoons, depending on how salty you want the meatballs. Even spread across a big pile of pasta, there's no need for that much seasoning.
Thanks for the recipe! I enjoyed it. I found that it came together very quickly. With 2 tsp. of pepper the taste was extreemly spicy. Had I allowed for the complete 3 hours, the taste may have had time to mellow. I love the way Gimmelean browns so nicely. This gave the me*tballs the "look". I will certainly be making this again!