Creamy 'satay' spinach

02/06/2013

I accidentally created a vegan creamy spinach dish a while ago. As I'm dairy intolerant, I was quite excited about this! I started off with making my own peanut butter (really easy, you should try it!), and added a bit of milk because it was so thick that my stick-mixer couldn't handle it. I ended up with a lovely creamy texture, to use in a spinach stir-fry kind of dish. You can use any kind of combination of vegetables, as long as the spinach or silverbeet is the main ingredient. Serve this with thick rice noodles, and it's also gluten free :-)

Ingredients for the peanut butter

  • 1 cup peanuts

  • Sesame oil

  • Salt

  • Dairy free milk (almond-, rice-, soy-, etc)

Ingredients for the sauce

  • 1 onion

  • 1 small carrot

  • 3 cloves garlic

  • 1/2 inch ginger root

  • Chilli, to taste

  • Cauliflower

  • Broccoli

  • Spinach (or silverbeet)

  • 1 stock cube

  • Water

  • Vegetable oil for frying

  • Pasta, rice noodles or rice for serving

Materials

  • Mortar & pestle, stick-mixer or food-processor

Preparation

Start with making the peanut butter by grinding up the peanuts. Choose whichever kitchen tool you have. I usually start in the mortar & pestle and then finish it off with the stick-mixer. Keep blending it until it starts to look like peanut butter, you might want to add some (sesame) oil to make it smoother. Then add a splash of milk (the milk is essential here) and a pinch of salt; it should look white and creamy now.

Chop all vegetables reasonably fine. Heat some oil in a frying pan and add the onions and carrots, fry for a few minutes. Then add garlic, ginger, chilli and cauliflower. After a few minutes, add the broccoli and fry everything until it's nearly cooked. Then add the spinach or silverbeet, a stock cube, the peanut butter and a splash of water to give it a nice sauce-like consistency. Cook just long enough so that the spinach is cooked.

Serve with pasta, thick rice noodles or rice.

Submitted by Lonneke

Creamy 'satay' spinach