Comfort Food: Vegan "Meatloaf"

One of the reasons I started this blog was to see if I could "veganize" the comfort foods I grew up eating. My G-mama was from Ellaville, Georgia (never heard of it? Biiig surprise) and one of the best cooks ever. She always had a freshly-brewed pitcher of sweet tea and a hot batch of biscuits waiting for us whenever we came to visit, and everything that came out of her kitchen was mouthwateringly delicious.

My family loves good ol' meatloaf and mashed potatoes (or, in the picture below, macaroni and cheese). Though I feel too much like a Northern California hippie calling this "veggie loaf", that's what it is. However, it looks just like the meatloaf my G-mama and mama used to make, minus all the ground up dead animal, saturated fat, and cholesterol. I adapted this from a vegetarian "meatball" recipe in Ladies Home Journal, but changed a few things around. The original called for bread crumbs, but store-bought bread crumb contain high fructose corn syrup and hydrogenated oil, which I refuse to eat. Ew. So I subbed some crushed up Triscuits and things came out beautifully. This recipe made a lot, but I didn't even mind eating this for a week straight. It was that good.

What are some of your family's favorite recipes?

Once again...it tastes better than this photograph would lead you to believe

Ingredients
1 cup crushed Triscuits (I put them in a Ziploc bag and hammered them with a metal ladle. Cathartic.)
1 cup nutritional yeast (you haven't bought any yet? What are you waiting for? Order it at Vitacost.com!)
1/2 cup finely chopped parsley
1 tbsp oregano
2 tsp dried basil
3 tbsp olive or coconut oil
1 large onion*, chopped
1 large eggplant, unpeeled and diced into 1/4 inch pieces
2 1/2 tsp kosher salt
1 1/2 cups finely chopped walnuts
3 garlic cloves*, minced
2 tbsp tomato paste
1/2 cup whole wheat flour

Directions 
1. Heat oven to 350.
2. In a bowl, combine Triscuits, nutritional yeast, parsley, oregano, and basil. Set aside.
3. Heat 3 tbsp of oil in skillet over medium high heat. Add onion, eggplant, and salt. Stir to coat with oil. Cook until soft, stirring occasionally (8-10 minutes).
4. Remove from heat. Add walnuts, garlic, and tomato paste.
5. Transfer half (only half!) of the mixture to a food processor and blend until smooth. (Warning: this puree will not look appetizing. Trust me on this one.)
6. Stir puree back into other half of eggplant mixture, add bread crumb mixture and flour. Stir until thoroughly mixed.
7. Transfer to a greased loaf pan, like this one from Pyrex. Bake 35 to 40 minutes, or until cooked through.

Also pictured is Curried Mac and Cheese, which will be posted tomorrow!

Organic veggies from Backyard Produce.