The Vegan Charcuterie Project: Summer Sausage

Having been born a seventy-year-old Eastern European woman trapped in the body of an infant, I used to have an inexplicable love for those boxes of dry cured sausage an

d aged cheese spread that would pop up around the holidays. My days of eating the traditional versions of any of that stuff are over, but with good fermented vegan cheeses starting to pop up, one needs a nice fake summer sausage to go with it.

Originally these were called summer sausages because the meat was dry cured with nitrates and nitrites and required no refrigeration, suitable for the warm summer months. I haven't attempted to actually dry cure seitan or soy, although maybe someday. Meanwhile, this sausage is easy to put together and tastes quite a bit like the kind I used to enjoy. It's rather salty in an atte

mpt to be authentic, and I like it that way, but saltphobes might want to taste before adding the crystallized salt.

Summer Sausage

Ingredients

1/2 c. navy beans

2 T miso

1 T liquid smoke

1 c. fake beef broth (I used 1 t. "better than bouillion" no beef base with 8oz water)

1 T non-hydrogenated vegetable shortening

1.5 T sugar

1 t. salt

5/8 t. black pepper

5/8 t. ground coriander seed

1/4 t. powdered ginger

1/4 t. garlic powder

1/4 t. ground mustard seed

1/8 c. nutritional yeast (nooch)

1 1/4 c. vital wheat gluten

Directions

1. Prepare steamer and bring water to a boil. Lay out four square sheets of aluminum foil.

2. Mash beans with a fork. Mix in other ingredients through nooch. Mix in gluten and taste for seasoning.

3. Split dough into four parts, form each into a log shape, roll in aluminum foil, and twist ends. Steam rolls for forty minutes.

4. Unwrap sausages, place on cooling rack inside oven, and bake at 150°F for an hour. (This step is optional, but dries the sausage out a bit)

Slice thinly and eat on crackers.