Sarmale are a great meal, though it can be a bit heavy, so this vegan version comes to improve that. In my original version that you can find here I used fresh cabbage and boiled it in lemon. However, for this version the real pickled cabbage works best.
Here’s how to make it:
Vegan sarmale
Pieces: 10-12
Preparation time: ~40 min
Cooking time filling: 20 min
Cooking time sarmale: 1 hour
Ingredients
- 10-12 leaves of pickled cabbage
- 1 onion
- 4 medium carrots
- 6-7 mushrooms
- 70 of rice
- 150 ml of tomato juice
- 1 tsp of thyme
- 1 tsp of paprika
- parsley (optional)
- salt and pepper
- a bit of sunflower oil for frying
- laurel leaves and few whole peppers
Directions
- In a bit of oil start cooking the dices onion and grated carrots until they soften, 5-10 min. Add a bit of salt.
- Add the diced mushrooms and let them cook until they reduce, 3-4 min.
- At this point you can add the thyme, paprika, washed rice, tomatoes and a bit of extra water.
- Let it cook half the time the instructions on the rice say. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
- Let the filling cool almost completely.
- For the assembly, make sure the leaves are not containing the hard part.
- Place a spoon of the filling on the bottom part of the leaf.
- Fold in the right and the left and start rolling from bottom to top.
- Shove in the endings and the “sarma” is ready.
- Place the cut parts on the bottom of the pot, add the laurel leaves and whole pepper.
- Arrange the sarmale in the pot, add 2-3 tsp of diced tomatoes or tomato paste and cover with hot water, until you cover them.
- Bring to a boil and then cook with a lid on on small fire for 1 hour or until the rice is fully cooked.
