'Chicken' Chermoula

Chermoula is a Moroccan sauce traditionally paired with fish. I first came across this Chermoula sauce recipe in a Martha Stewart cookbook before I was vegetarian. In the original recipe this sauce is poured over wine poached chicken. These days we pour it over Gardein vegetarian chicken breasts.  This sauce is so vibrant and flavourful you will find it delicious with any protein. Try it with tofu or seitan.

What I really love about this sauce is the simplicity. There are alot of ingredients but there is no cooking involved. So for camping or cottaging it is easy because you can pre-pack a spice blend and then just add the wet ingredients at your site. Or just pre-make the entire recipe and bring it in your cooler. I promise, it will brighten up the most spartan of dinners.

What you need:

A container to mix the sauce in
1 TBSP ground cumin
1 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp cayenne
1 TBSP minced garlic
3 TBSP fresh lemon
2 TBSP olive oil
1/3 cup finely chopped parsley
1/3 cup finely chopped cilantro
1/3 cup tomato juice
1/2 tsp salt
1/8 tsp pepper

Instructions:

1. Combine all ingredients
2. Serve 1/4 cup sauce over your preferred protein

BBQ Seitan and Peaches

I think this dish was our bbq hit of the summer. Summery, sweet, salty, meaty, fruity and simple! We make out seitan ahead of time, using the Veganomicon simple seitan recipe which you can find here if you don't have the cookbook (btw, you should probably get that cookbook). Anyway, make sure you travel it in a container with the cooking liquid otherwise it will dry out. Peaches and seitan cook at different times so thread them on individual skewers so you can start them at different times. Also we find that if you put bbq sauce on your grillables to early the sugar in the sauce will burn, so cook your seitan for the most part before brushing on the sauce.

What you need:

Skewers
Seitan, 1 x 1" cubed
BBQ sauce
Peaches, halved and pitted
Olive oil
Salt and Pepper

Instructions:

1. Coat, by brush or by gently tossing in a bowl, peaches in a little oil.
2. Thread peaches on a couple of skewers

3. Thread seitan cubes on skewers. Brush with oil so they don't stick to the grill.
4. Cook seitan until the edges start to brown, turning several times to cook evenly.

5. Once the cooking time is almost complete start slathering bbq sauce on the seitan and cook until a nice glaze has formed. You will need to watch to make sure it doesn't burn.
6. Depending on the ripeness of your peaches you will probably want to put them on the grill when you get to the bbq sauce stage with your seitan.
7. Cook your peaches until they have grill marks and are nice and soft.
8. Plate cooked bbq seitan and peach on a plate. Serve with salad or fresh corn.

Admittedly, I am a terrible food photographer.

Campfire version:

Same but ditch the skewers. Do the seitan in a pan and peaches in foil on the grill!