Vegan Jerk, Greens + Rice & Peas

 

Hey everyone! I really wanted to do a weekend of soul food and some of my favs I grew up eating. So this week I thought, let's do a jerk sauce from things I can grab in the garden, some coconut rice & peas and some greens which is always a go to.

Jerk Sauce

  • Scallions

  • Habanero Peppers

  • Garlic

  • Clementine

  • Pineapple Juice

  • Red Chilli

  • Ginger

  • Allspice Berries

  • Onion Salt

  • Cinnamon

  • Curry Powder

  • Soy Sauce

  • Pineapple Juice

  • Tomato Puree

  • Brown Sugar

  • Time

Ingredients

  • Cauliflower

  • Black Kale

  • Greens

  • Breadcrumbs

  • Pine Nuts

  • Liquid Smoke

  • Red Onion

  • White Onion

  • Basmati Rice

  • Kidney Beans

  • Coconut Cream

  • Vegetable Stock

So let's start off with the jerk sauce! This is something that I've always made with fam and it's very spicy and more of a cooking sauce than a dipping sauce, it has a green taste to it from the fresh ingredients and is super fruity. If you wanted to make it more of a conventional jerk you could skip the clementine and replace the scallions with a cooked white onion which gives more of a fuller flavour.

So I added a bunch of the scallions, two habanero peppers, one red chilli and a tsp of allspice berries. Then a tsp of some cinnamon, ground allspice, half a tsp of cinnamon, 2 tsp of brown sugar, six cloves of garlic, a tsp of fresh ginger, and blended it to a paste. I then added a cup and a half of pineapple juice, half a cup of tomato puree and kept blending til it was smooth. Then added half a clementine and It's SUPER delicious and fruity, but you can add or take away from the chilli as you wish. 

I grabbed some time out of my garden and diced up a cauliflower into four sections, I thought it would replicate the size of a chicken breast so you can spread this out to your whole family if you're cooking a big wad of it. You'll have enough jerk to coat two cauliflowers easily. Roast them for about 25 minutes in olive oil.

I then cooked a white onion until translucent and started to prepare the rice and peas in a pan. Throw in some basmati rice with some vegetable stock and cook it out for 15 minutes. You normally put 2:1 water to rice. Let it absorb and then add half a small carton of coconut cream. It's super delicious, and cook it out with some light seasoning.

Then add the kidney beans, I used half a can and some water. I cooked them out until the liquid had evaporated! Next let's start on a second pan for the greens. I diced a red onion up loosely and fried in some olive oil and some liquid smoke to give a smokey flavor.

I added some dice blacked kale and some fresh washed greens, I then added some boiling water and two tsp of curry powder to give some extra flavour. You can cook this for as little as 3 minutes but it tastes like boiled cabbage with very little to it so what I do, is keep it moving for about 15 minutes.

I took the slightly charred cauliflower out of the oven and based in the jerk sauce, you need it to cover evenly as it sweetens as it cooks and is so yummy you can't even describe.

I removed all the water from the pan of greens, then added some fresh chopped garlic, pine nuts, and a tbsp of golden breadcrumbs. Cook out with a splash of butter and set aside for serving.

The rice should have dehydrated all the liquid and be creamy and fluffy, the cauliflower takes another 20 minutes to cook with the sauce and the final should look like this! 

Finish with a fresh lime and some time, I kept some of the jerk left over to serve with to give a freshness to the cooked part and it's ready to devour!

Let me know if you try these recipes out at home!

 
Joseph Harwood