Vegan Bolognese

With both my honey and his daughter being vegetarian, I have been on a quest to find a good meat substitute for certain of my favorite dishes, most of which use sausage. I haven't had good results, with none of them having the right texture, and few of them having an honestly sausage-y taste.

I don't get a chance to cook very often for his kids, and they are unadventurous and picky eaters, so I figured pasta to be a safe choice. How about a nice, hearty Bolognese? I had one more veggie sausage to try, one I found at Aldi, called Lightlife, which came in a bulk tube, the better with which to cook it up as a meaty sauce. 

It has a taste more like a breakfast sausage, so I added some garlic and ground fennel for an Italian flavor, lots of onion, some ground carrots and baby bella mushrooms for more texture, and cheated by using a simple TJ's marinara sauce. 

1 lb tube of Lightlife Gimme Lean Veggie Sausage
3 tbp olive oil
1 tsp fennel seed, coarsely ground
2 garlic cloves, minced
2 medium or one large onion
2 medium carrots
4 oz. baby bella mushrooms (or more if you like them)
6 cups of your favorite marinara sauce

Heat your pan, and then add the olive oil, sausage and fennel seed, all at once. Cook on low-med heat, chopping the sausage with a wooden spoon to break up as it cooks.

While it cooks, shred the carrots and mushrooms in the food processor. To get a find texture, I put the carrots through the large grate blade first, then remove it and use the chopping blade as I add the mushrooms. Chopping them this finely will result in them not being distinguishable in the sauce. Process to the texture you like, and add with the garlic to the sausage mix until incorporated.

Chop onion in 1/4" dice, and add to the pan. Saute until translucent, then add the sauce.

Simmer on low heat for 45 minutes- 1 hour. Serve over a hearty pasta, such as rigatoni.

This will make a big enough batch to freeze some for later.