This is another dish that’s just crying out to be sorted: vegan dauphinoise potatoes gratin. It’s rather decadent I know, but hey, who’s checking up! My mum certainly isn’t. I did a quick look-up on line and found a few candidate non-vegan recipes, then just did a bit of judicious substitution.
Fortunately there are now quite a few vegan cream subsitutes available on the market. Oatly, Elmlea or Alpro work well. Whilst oat milk makes a great milk substitute as it doesn’t curdle when cooked. I added some veg stock, and next time, I think I’ll add a little nutritional yeast.
This dish is one of those where a decent slicing machine really comes in handy. It has to be said, a Graef slicer makes quick work of slicing the potatoes. With a knife it would a long job, and getting the slices thin enough would be a nightmare. It’s literally no problem with a Graef slicer.
I’ve tried various methods, but steaming the potato slices first, while you make the cream mixture first is deffo the way to go. Give them around 8 minutes and it means they cook beautifully in just 30 minutes in the oven.
Sprinking a bit of vegan parmesan cheese on top and a little black pepper too really finishes it off well. You could also add a sprinkling of smoked or ordinary paprika, and maybe even some breadcrumbs. I also added a few dobs of vegan butter as a final touch.
This dish goes so well with lasagne, pastitsio, spinach & lentil pie etc. Vegan dauphinoise potatoes gratin – what’s not to like! I also like it with a side of my wholemeal garlic bread Yum Yum!
Vegan dauphinoise potatoes au gratin - original versino
Ingredients
- 600 g waxy potatoes
- 3 cloves garlic grated, crushed or blitzed
- 250 g vegan cream Elmlea is good or Alpro
- 250 g oat milk
- 50 g soya yogurt optional but nice if you have it
- 1 teasp veg stock
- 1 tbsp nutritional yeast
- 130 g vegan gruyere or other vegan hard cheese
- 20 g vegan butter
- 1 teasp black pepper
- 1 tbsp bread crumbs
- 1 teasp garlic powder optional
- 1 teasp onion powder optional
Instructions
- scrub, but don't peel the potatoes & remove any manky bits
- Slice the potatoes on about a 4 or 5 mm setting - that's easy on a Graeff slicer as it's calibrated in mm
- Steam the sliced potatoes for around 8 minutes to get them going a bit. This reduces the overall cooking time considerably.
- add some cold pressed olive oil to a medium sized pan, and add the blitzed garlic
- sautee until browning nicely.
- Add the oat milk to the sauteed garlic to stop it browning further
- Add the rest of the ingredients, yogurt, vegan butter, plant cream and bring to a very low simmer - you're just making sure it's piping hot so that as it goes in the oven it all starts cooking right away.
- So, transfer half the potatoes to an oven dish .
- Then pour half the hot cream sauce over the potatoes. Then sprinkle half (65g) of the vegan hard cheese over the potatoes.
- Add the rest of the potatoes and then gently pour the rest of the sauce onto the potatoes.
- Sprinkle the other half of the cheese on top along with the black pepper, paprika and bread crumbs if you're using them.
- bake to a nice brown finish in the oven on 180°C Fan for 30 minutes.
- check after 25 minutes, They should be getting nicely browned - if so, continue for the full 30 minutes, or continue a bit more if not quite brown enough. Then serve!
