Tofu & Lentil Vegetarian Meatloaf
Altered from a meatloaf recipe I saw in Giant Food's healthy ideas. Fun to make and a little time-consuming, but worth it because just like meat lover's meatloaf, it has a lot of versatility for leftovers. It says on the card that if you use cooking wine for the red wine, to omit the salt. It originally called for whole wheat breadcrumbs and 3/4 lb each of lean ground beef and lean ground turkey. Firm tofu has a good consistency for this, as does Nasoya Soft. Vegans can easily veganize this with using ground flax and water, or a commercial vegan egg replacer, as a binder. I'd recommend serving this with broccoli and roasted baby carrots and pasta with tomato sauce. The magazine recommends sauteed spinach and red potatoes. Feel free to sub your own tomato sauce if you don't want to make the one listed, I didn't make it; but included for those who might like to.
INGREDIENTS
NutritionSAUCE
- 1(6 ounce) can salt-free tomato paste
- 1⁄2cup water
- 1⁄2cup dry red wine
- 1
- 1⁄2teaspoon dried basil
- 1⁄2teaspoon dried oregano
- 1⁄4teaspoon kosher salt
TOFU AND LENTIL FILLING
- 1(17 ounce) package firm tofu
- 1tablespoon olive oil
- 1tablespoon soy sauce
- 1⁄2
- 1
BINDERS
- 1cup breadcrumbs (2 slices of bread if you want to grate your own)
- 1⁄2
- 2egg whites
DIRECTIONS
- Combine tomato paste, water, wine, garlic, basil, oregano, and salt in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil and and reduce the heat to low. Simmer uncovered for about 15 minutes, then set aside.
- Wash and sort through the lentils, removing any sticks, pebbles, etc. and bring 3 cups of water to a boil. Lower the heat and cook the lentils, loosely covered, for about 20 minutes or until soft but not disintegrating. Drain any excess water.
- While the lentils are cooking, make the tofu "ground beef" by draining it very well and drying it off with paper towels, then (here comes the fun part), smash it into a bunch of pieces, so it has a ground beef or scrambled egg like consistency.
- Mix the tofu pieces in a bowl with the pepper (I just shake some on, roughly 1/2 tsp), olive oil, and soy sauce. Brown in a frying pan/skillet for a couple minutes until it somewhat resembles ground beef and let cool for a few minutes.
- Combine the cooked lentils, crumbled and cooked tofu, breadcrumbs, zucchini, egg whites, and about 1/2 cup of the tomato sauce in a large bowl and mix well.
- Shape the mixture into a loaf and place into an ungreased 9 x 5 loaf pan. Bake at 350F for 45 minutes.
- Pour the remaining tomato sauce mix over the top of the loaf, and bake for another 15 minutes.
- Place onto a serving plate and let cool for about 10 minutes before cutting into 8 slices and serving.