Fauxmale

Vegan Sarmale

It all started with stevie. In english, stevia. Still lost? Good. So am I.

I saw someone selling some interesting-shaped leaves at the farmer’s market near Gara De Nord. It was called stevie. The peasant/vendor told me to eat it with urda, raw or cooked. When I got home and did a bit of research, I couldn’t find any recipies or indications that you could eat it raw. The only cooked version was Sarmale. So stevie turns out to be a leaf, similar to cabbage or grape, which you can roll with sarmale filling in it.

One of the main ingredients with most sarmale is meat. Which I don’t eat. Problem.

One alternative is making sarmale with urda, which I was preparing for until I opened up my packaged urda and saw that it was covered in mold. Ouch. Time for plan B.

Another alternative is tofu. I had some tofu/vegan parizer which I substituted for meat, mixed it with rice, tomato sauce and some condiments. I wrapped it in the stevie leaves.

I simmered it in water, tomato sauce, and a bit of pickle juice (BECAUSE I CAN) and it turned out fantastic. Now, not fantastic like my mom makes ‘em, but considering it was my first time with sarmale, and I tottally winged the recipe, it came out pretty good.

So yay, fauxmale!