Now that the holidays are getting closer, I want to help y’all be set for success to wow all of your friends & family with amazing vegan food that they would never guess is vegan. Pate is a recipe I get asked to make by a lot of you, pretty much all year… but this recipe is perfect for the holiday season & for entertaining. It’s incredibly easy to make, and will definitely impress anyone you make it for!
Over the next few weeks, be prepared for all the holiday spam… it’ll be a lot, but y’all ask & y’all shall receive! I have lots of fun recipes that you can make multiple of to create a full meal, or make just one or two to bring to a potluck. This is the first of my holiday recipes, and I wanted to start out with a fucking bang, and bring y’all this amazing, fancy ass pate.
First let’s start out with the pate. It may seem like this is a difficult / time consuming recipe, but I promise it’s not. The most time consuming part is soaking the pecans, which you can do overnight the day before if you want to make things quicker the day of! You can also make the pate the day before as well, so that the day of you can just make the toast points & caramelized oranges.
Like I mentioned, first things first is soaking the pecans. I’d say minimum of an hour, but you can do them overnight as well. While that’s working, add your dried porcini mushrooms to a bowl and cover them with boiling water. I like to add some plastic wrap or a plate or something on top of the bowl, to really let them steam. Those you’ll want to let sit for at least 15 minutes, but MAKE SURE TO RESERVE THE SOAKING LIQUID from these mushrooms, because we will need it later. These two things are honestly the most difficult part of the whole recipe, haha.
While the porcini mushrooms & pecans are doing their thing, we can move on to the portobellos. These add a really meaty texture to the pate, and give it a lot more body than the porcini mushrooms will. The porcini mushrooms also have a really intense flavor, as where the portobellos are more mild, so they help balance out the flavor of the pate overall. For the marinade on these guys, whisk together your Tamari (or soy sauce if you don’t need this to be gluten free), olive oil, nutritional yeast, lemon juice, fresh rosemary, and miso until everything is well combined. Remove the stems and the ‘gills’ from the portobellos, and chop into small chunks, then toss them into the marinade until everything is coated well. I like to let these sit in the marinade for about 10-15 minutes, just to let the mushrooms really soak up all the flavor in that marinade.
Once everything is ready to go, we can make the pate (finally!!!). Drain your pecans well & add them to a food processor, along with your portobello mushrooms & marinade, as well as the sun dried tomatoes- and pulse until you have large chunks formed. Remove the porcini from the soaking liquid (making sure to reserve the liquid) and give them a rough chop. Add those into the food processor and continue to pulse until a rough paste starts to form. You might not need to add any liquid, but if you do, slowly add in some of the reserved porcini soaking liquid, while the processor is running, to help the pate out a little bit. You shouldn’t need much of the liquid, I used a few tablespoons to get my mixture together. Just make sure to not add too much, because you don’t want to turn this mixture into a liquid! Check for seasoning, and add some salt if needed.
The caramelized orange segments are what really send this pate over the top, and are sure to impress anyone you serve these too. You’ll only need two ingredients… oranges, and light brown sugar. You will need a kitchen torch, or a broiler to accomplish the caramelization though, but either will work! To segment the oranges easily, take the whole orange and cut it into 1/4″ thick slices. Then cut each slice into 4 pieces. Once you have those, carefully cut away the rind, so that you have just a triangular shape of orange left. Add an even layer of brown sugar over the top of each orange segment, and place them in a single layer on a baking sheet. If you’re using a torch, hold the flame about 2 inches away from the orange, and in a circular motion, hold the flame over the sugar until it forms a golden caramel… then immediately remove the flame & move onto the next one. If you’re using a broiler, put your tray of oranges under the broiler on high, until a golden caramel forms, and then immediately remove the tray from the oven.
Now the only thing left is the vehicle to hold your pate & oranges! I used a rosemary bread for this, to compliment the flavor in the pate… but you can use a baguette, sourdough, gluten free bread (the pate is gluten free), or really any kind of bread you’d like! Cut the bread into points, and then bake in an oven until just lightly toasted (let’s say 400F for 5ish minutes?), flipping frequently to make sure both sides toast up.
You can serve this ‘family style’, by putting the pate in a bowl & topping with fresh chopped rosemary, and serving the toast points & caramelized oranges on the side… or you can assemble each toast for a prettier presentation / less work for your guests. If you’re doing that, just smear a decent amount of pate on each toast point, add an orange segment on top and then sprinkle over some freshly chopped rosemary.
This recipe really couldn’t be more fucking amazing, and I swear that if this doesn’t impress whoever you make it for… hell I’ll like send you a box of homemade cookies as an apology, haha. As always, tag me in your recreations on Instagram so I can be in awe of how amazing y’all are! You can find me @plvntfood or #plvntfood. Love y’all endlessly, & hope everyone has a great holiday season.
Porcini Pate with Caramelized Orange
This VEGAN Pecan & Porcini Pate with Rosemary Toast & Caramelized Orange is the perfect appetizer to wow any guests at your holiday parties this year.
Ingredients
Porcini Pate
- 1 cup pecans
- 1/2 cup dried porcini mushrooms
- 1 cup boiling water
- 1/2 lb portobello mushrooms
- 2 tbsp tamari or soy sauce
- 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- 1 tbsp nutritional yeast
- 1/2 tbsp lemon juice
- 2 tsp fresh rosemary
- 1 tsp mellow white miso
- 2 sun-dried tomatoes preferably dry packed, not oil packed
- salt / pepper to taste
Other Ingredients
- 2 oranges I used valencia
- 1/2 cup light brown sugar
- 1 loaf rosemary bread or any bread to make toast that you like
- 3 tbsp fresh rosemary finely chopped
Instructions
Porcini Pate
-
Place your pecans (unsalted) in a bowl, and cover with cold water. Allow them to soak for one hour.
-
Cover your dried porcini mushrooms with boiling water & let sit for 15 minutes.
-
Stem / de-gill your portobello mushrooms & dice into small chunks.
-
Whisk together Tamari, olive oil, nutritional yeast, lemon juice, fresh rosemary, & miso. Add the portobello mushrooms, stir to combine well, and let sit for 15 minutes.
-
Drain your pecans, and add them to a food processor along with your portobello mushrooms & marinade, & sun dried tomatoes. Pulse until large chunks form.
-
Remove your porcini mushrooms from the soaking liquid (reserving the liquid), chop them roughly, and add them into the food processor.
-
Turn the processor on until you get a pate texture. If you need to add some liquid to thin it out, use some of the reserved porcini mushroom soaking liquid. Season with salt if needed.
Finishing the Pate
-
Cut your slices of bread into fours, and toast on a baking sheet until just crisped on both sides.
-
Cut your oranges into slices, then into fours, and then cut off the rind, leaving a triangular orange segment. Coat the top of each segment with brown sugar (in a thin, even layer), and using either a torch or your broiler, brûlée the sugar onto the orange.
-
Serve the pate in a bowl, topped with fresh chopped rosemary, with the toast points & caramelized oranges on the side... or if you want to serve them already assembled, smear some pate on a toast point, add a segment of caramelized orange, and top with some chopped fresh rosemary.
