Walnut Porcini Creamless Sauce with Cauliflower Wheat Gnocchi
Servings: 4 servings
Calories:
Walnuts and mushrooms are an earthy pairing that you usually find in Vegan restaurants served as "taco meat". In this recipe, we make a "cream" sauce by combining them with miso and white wine. Yes decadent, yes crazy delicious, no dairy, and no oil. Barely miso has a very strong umami flavor profile but is difficult to find in grocery stores. I have successfully replaced it with brown rice miso. It is a hit served over your favorite gnocchi or pasta.
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Equipment
- High speed Blender
- Medium sauce pan
- Stock Pot
- Cutting Board with Chef Knife
Ingredients
Sauce
- 1 cup toasted walnuts
- ½ oz. dried porcini mushrooms rehydrated, strained, chopped coarse; soaking liquid reserved and strained
- 2 tbsp brown rice miso or barley miso
- 1 medium shallot
- 2 small garlic cloves
- 2 tbsp red wine vinegar
- ½ tsp red pepper flake
- 2 tbsp Braggs Amino Liquids
- ½ cup dry white wine
Cauliflower Gnocchi
- 1 16- ounce bag frozen cauliflower florets or rice or about 5 cups fresh
- 1 cup whole wheat flour
- aquafaba from 1 15oz. can
- 1 tbsp Nutritional Yeast
- ½ teaspoon salt optional
Instructions
Cauliflower Gnocchi
- If using fresh cauliflower, bring a pot of water to boil. Add cauliflower, cook for 5-8 minutes until tender. Drain. If not using fresh cauliflower, move to step 2.
- Lay cauliflower on a clean towel and allow to cool for 5-10 minutes. Squeeze ALL water out.
- Place cauliflower in a food processor. Pulse until it is pureed (like mashed potatoes) using aquafaba to blend smooth. Add Nutritional Yeast, flour, and salt. Pulse until a soft, sticky dough forms adding a bit more flour as needed.
- You can replace step 3 by pureeing the cauliflower in a high-speed blender using aquafaba to blend until smooth. Place flour on a work surface. Make a well in the flour, add cauliflower to the well, sprinkle on Nutritional Yeast and salt. Work in the flour with your hands and a scarper until the dough is formed.
- Rest the dough for 10 minutes covered with plastic wrap on a floured work surface. Cut into sections. Roll each section into a rope. Cut each rope into little gnocchi pieces (about 1-inch pieces).
- Boil water in a medium size pot. Working in batches, add the gnocchi. When it floats to the top, cook for another 1-2 minutes. Move to a serving bowl. When all are cooked top with sauce. Thin the sauce out with some gnocchi water. Top with grinds of pepper and chopped parsley.
Sauce
- Pour 1 cup of boiling water over dried porcini mushrooms. Let sit until mushrooms have rehydrated. Lift mushrooms out of the liquid and chop coarsely; strain the soaking liquid and set aside.
- Heat a large sauté pan, toast the walnuts (2-3 minutes). Lower heat and add the shallots, red pepper flakes, and garlic. Cook another 1 minute constantly moving them around in the pan to avoid burning. Add a bit of water if you see it is starting to burn.
- Add mushrooms, miso, wine, vinegar, Braggs Amino Liquids, and salt; sauté to release flavors, 3 to 4 minutes. Add a bit of water if you see it is starting to burn.
- Working in batches, carefully transfer the sauce to a high-speed blender and pureed it. Use the reserved liquids and more wine or water to puree each batch to a creamy smooth sauce. Pour into another saucepan. Continue until all the sauce is pureed. Pour sauce over your favorite pasta.
