“I’m going vegetarian.” It is a phrase that can strike fear into the heart of anyone who cooks for a household. I applaud your principled stance on animal rights and your environmental conscience, but the thought of making two dinners every evening does not thrill me. Two years on, our family comprises one pescatarian, one no-red-meatarian, one occasional beef-eater and two committed carnivores, and I’ve gradually worked out how to make dinners to suit everyone.
The trick is to make one base and split it. For example, alongside our regular Jamie Oliver traybake of chicken thighs with potatoes, tomatoes and fresh herbs, I now also roast Rukmini Iyer’s gnocchi, baby peppers and squash, topped (towards the end of the cooking time) with slices of halloumi. On the occasions that I indulge the two who crave steak, the rest of us have fish; we supplement barbecues with Aldi’s spicy bean burgers and Linda McCartney’s more sturdy vegetarian mozzarella burgers.
However, most of the meals I make are in big pots, so there is always some extra for a dropping-in friend or for the freezer. I make a base sauce in one pot, and put about one-third of it into another pot just before adding the meat. The type of sauce determines the non-animal protein: for those with a tomato or yoghurt base, I use pulses (usually tinned chickpeas) or paneer, an Indian cheese available from Asian shops and larger supermarkets. With a coconut milk sauce I use tofu (our favourite is the silky organic block by Vemondo, from Lidl).
You can make the falafel yourself, but I think all that effort is wasted unless the flavour is very clearly discernible in a wrap or with a salad
Occasionally, I flip the recipe: we love the flavours of the Happy Pear black bean chilli, so I brown mince in one saucepan and put half of the veggie mix into it, then add the beans to the other half. The BBC Good Food site has a delicious sweet potato and chickpea curry recipe to which I sometimes add chicken.
Our menu evolves constantly as I think of ways to adapt our staples (we now enjoy butter-butter beans alongside butter chicken), and there are lots of meat substitutes, such as plant balls and Quorn, that I haven’t tried yet. Each of the recipes here will serve about 10 people, based on a 2:1 ratio of meat-eaters to vegetarians and allowing for leftovers.
The Tofupiaza recipe is adapted from Murgh Dopiaza, which is Hindi for “chicken with two onions”; to suit a friend who can’t tolerate onions, I substituted scallions and renamed it Murgh Nopiaza. I find chicken thighs better than breast fillets for robust curries such as this.
Meatballs and falafel can be interchangeable in a tomato sauce. My meatball methodology has improved with time. I make the sauce first, put some of it in another pot, and then let the meatballs cook in it very gently. In the other pot I put falafel, which you can make yourself (but I think all that effort is wasted unless the flavour is very clearly discernible in a wrap or with a salad).
If they are going into a pot of sauce, the falafels widely available in supermarkets work very well, but don’t cook them for too long or they will disintegrate. Dunnes Stores sells 170g packs of both spicy and Mediterranean-flavoured falafels that hold their own in the gravy (and freeze well).
You can keep ready-made meatballs in the freezer and put them straight into the sauce, but if you have time to make something more flavoursome, you don’t have to be too precise with the proportions.
For Indian kofta, mix 600g beef or lamb mince in a large bowl with a couple of teaspoons of ground coriander, ground cumin, ground fenugreek, ground or crushed chilli, a handful of finely chopped fresh coriander leaves, and season to taste.
For Italian meatballs, mix the mince with 100g breadcrumbs and chopped parsley (or cheat and use stuffing), 50g grated Parmesan, 3 teaspoons of dried oregano, a few gratings of nutmeg, and seasoning.
Recipe: Tofupiaza (tofu or chicken with spring onions)
Recipe: Falafel or meatballs/kofte with Indian tomato sauce or Italian tomato sauce
