I’m not really that much of a sandwich person – I like them well enough but just don’t find myself making or ordering them very often. Part of my problem is finding vegetarian and vegan sandwiches – meat is a key component of most, and egg or cheese is pretty largely featured in the rest. But they are such a convenient and enjoyable lunch! One of my goals for this year is to figure out more sandwich recipes.
OK, I just re-read that last sentence and realized that if you can say something like “one of my goals is to eat more sandwiches” you are either doing something very wrong in life or something very right. I’ll go with the latter for now.
Anyway – this is a good sandwich! It’s a layer of creamy pesto and then some roasted red peppers, onions, and portobello mushrooms. Deeee-lish. And not as complicated as you might think, either. Just make some roasted red peppers (quick and easy recipe here) and then slice some onions and portobello mushrooms into strips. Brush the mushrooms with some balsamic vinegar and throw it all on a cookie sheet:
Stick it under the broiler (which you already warmed up making the roasted red peppers) for about 5 minutes, until everything is just starting to brown. While you’re waiting on that you can blend together your pesto sauce by combining some basil, walnuts, olive oil, and garlic in the food processor. (I know pesto is traditionally made with pine nuts but at least at my store they are crazy expensive! 28 bucks a pound, are you kidding me? Is that how much they always cost or is there some sort of pine nut shortage I didn’t know about? No biggie though because walnuts worked great.)
This is more of a pesto spread than a sauce – nice and thick so you can layer it on your sandwich. Once your onions, mushrooms and peppers are ready you can assemble everything like so:
This is delicious warm but it also works just great cold so you could pack it as a lunch or picnic no problem. If you use gluten free bread the rest of it is gluten free, I went with a ciabatta type bread and it was wonderful.
So, the real question is: what other vegan sandwiches should I try? Or maybe really challenge me and give me a non-vegan sandwich to figure out how to veganize!
Pesto and Roasted Red Pepper Sandwich
Ingredients
- 1 Roasted Red Bell Pepper
- 1 large portobello mushroom sliced into strips
- 1 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
- 1 onion sliced into rings and cut in half
- 2 leaves romaine or other lettuce
- 1 cup fresh basil
- ¼ cup raw walnuts
- 1 tsp olive oil
- 1 clove garlic
- ¼ tsp salt
- 1 tsp water
- 1 tsp nutritional yeast optional
- 4 slices bread
Instructions
- Roast red peppers. While they are roasted, brush your portobello with balsamic vinegar and let sit for a couple minutes. Once peppers are done, place portobello and mushroom slices on a cookie sheet and place under broiler for 5 minutes or so until they are just starting to brown.
- To make the pesto sauce, combine basil, walnuts, olive oil, garlic, salt, water, and nutritional yeast in a blender or food processor and blend until smooth. Spread onto bread slices and then top with lettuce, mushrooms, onions, and red peppers.
Oh my gosh, that looks so good! I’m going to have to make that next time I have some gf ciabatta lying around.
This sandwich looks amaZING!!! You should try veganizing a muffaletta sandwich.
I make tempeh bacon for BLTs, which is delish and easy. Chickpea salad sandwiches are great too. I don’t know if you follow this (http://www.namelymarly.com/) blog, but she just finished a series of veganizing America’s Top 10 Sandwiches–they’re pretty complicated, but it’s fun to read anyhow!
This looks amazing!!! I want to live in your backyard =)
This looks really good! I think it would be perfect for a picnic or something.