Mushroom and Chestnut Wellington
Inspired by a Waitrose recipe, we had this in the flat for our Christmas meal before we broke up. This is vegetarian, but super easy to make vegan (a 1 ingredient substitute job). We also tweaked a few things, there are a couple notes below if you want to check it out.
Song suggestions:
Little Things - ABBA
Magic Day (feat. Mia Niles) - Loving Caliber
Top tips:
Pans: use the biggest pan you can find when cooking the veg - it takes up a fair amount of space!
Goat’s cheese: this isn’t just for flavour, it also helps to set the Wellington log firmly in the fridge (as it cools, it binds everything together and holds it well in place). So if making this vegan, you can just skip it entirely and make sure you roll it really tightly, or use a dairy-free cream cheese. Cool the vegetable mixture before adding it or it might just melt and you won’t be able to roll it.
Spinach: the original recipe calls for it to be blanched to preserve the flavour and nutrients - if you don’t have the patience, or aren’t too fussed and just want the spinach in and ready, wilt it into the veg mix after cooking the bulk of it. Don’t reduce it too much, so don’t wilt it completely but they should also no longer be structured/solid leaves.
Ovens: if you have a gas oven, check on it halfway through. When I made this at uni on my test run the week before our dinner, the side of the Wellington facing the flame of our gas oven had cooked way more than the front. So consider checking in case you need to swivel it inside the oven to give the other side a chance to cook. If you have a fan/electric oven, this shouldn’t be necessary.
Ingredients:
1 bag spinach (260g)
50g dairy-free butter
1 tbsp olive oil
2 leeks (if small, use a third)
Thyme (preferably fresh, about 10 sprigs or 2 tbsp dried)
2 cloves garlic
500g chestnut mushrooms
2 packs cooked chestnuts (Merchant Gourmet are the best)
150g goat’s cheese (even better if garlic and herb flavoured. If vegan, use a dairy-free cream cheese)
1 roll puff pastry
“Egg wash” (2 tbsp milk, 1 tsp maple syrup)
Recipe:
Prepare your vegetables:
Chop the leeks
Peel and mince the garlic
Dice the chestnut mushrooms
Finely dice/crumble the chestnuts
Remove the thyme from sprigs if using fresh thyme
Blanch the spinach - boil it in water for 1 minute, then remove and place immediately in ice cold water. This preserves the spinach’s flavour and nutrients, but if you want to cut a corner just add the spinach to the veg mix in step 3 at the end and cook until slightly wilted.
In a pan, gently heat the butter and oil together. Add the leeks and garlic, and cook for 5-7 minutes until soft. Add the mushrooms and thyme, cook for about 50 minutes until soft and slightly smaller. Make sure to evaporate as much liquid from the mix as you can.
In a large mixing bowl, combine the cooked vegetables, spinach, crumbled chestnuts and goat’s cheese.
On a sheet of greaseproof paper, spoon out the mixture into a log shape and roll tightly into a cylinder. Chill in the fridge for 1 hour to firm up.
When ready to cook, preheat the oven to 200°C. Unroll the puff pastry sheet onto a clean work surface, unwrap the filling and gently roll the log onto the puff pastry sheet, a few centimetres from the edge. If you’d like to cut out any shapes for the top, do so here.
Make the “egg wash” and brush along the edges of the pastry that you’ll be sealing. When ready, fold the empty half of the pastry sheet over the top of filling and seal down the edges by crimping it down with a fork.
If you haven’t cut out any shapes for the top, score some slits on the top of the pastry so that steam from the inside can escape as it cooks.
Give the pastry a good “egg wash” on top and bake for 30 minutes.
A Bite Out of Life
During our last week in the flat before breaking up for Christmas, we squeezed in as many things as we could. All the Christmas films, trips around town to see all the lights, roasted chestnuts, Bailey’s hot chocolates, winter walks, wreath making, pom-poms for the Christmas tree, you name it - we did it. But we couldn’t leave without having one final hurrah, despite having our flat Christmas dinner on the Monday evening before leaving. On our last morning in the flat on the Friday of our last week, we had a big pancake breakfast together. I made a big batch of vegan crêpes and some gluten-free ones the night before and in the morning we put a Christmas playlist blasting through the TV, we covered the table in lemon slices, sugar, Biscoff, fruit, cups of tea, chocolates, maple syrup, all sorts. We snapped over some leftover crackers from our Christmas dinner and sat around playing the charades, humming the tunes, and crying at how bad the jokes were. We relived the laughs of the term and just enjoyed each other’s company, something we had never done before in the morning because during term time everyone’s off to the library and in lectures. We loved it! Being a student can often be isolating and lonely - food is a powerful tool to bring us all together and it can start with just two ingredients. Crêpes are alwayssss a good idea!
