Creamy vegan pasta

Cooking as a student: good or not? 

For students, going out can get a little bit expensive, that’s why I think that we, as students, need to know how to cook simple, but filling and delicious dishes to help ourselves with our budget. During my years of being a student and also an Erasmus student who has been away from home for longer months, I have practiced cooking, having many reasons or goals in the back of my thoughts such as saving money for extra travels, eating more healthier, not finding the foods I like or can eat – because I am vegan – in the restaurants, canteens or supermarket, and just enjoying cooking as an act of relaxation.

Don't be afraid to improvise!

For the cooking skills, tips and tricks or knowledge that I currently have I should as well thank my mother for because she has always been preparing foods at home, thus I was keeping an eye on her cooking as much as I could. Somehow, the preparation of my plant based food is, in my opinion, easier than the rest of the dishes because it always gives me chances of improvisation with the ingredients or leftovers that I have on hand.

Creamy vegan pasta: the ingredients that you need 

Today I am cooking pasta again and the ingredients that I am using are the following:

• 500 grams pasta (you can use any kind of pasta you prefer, but I am having fusili and penne)

• Mushrooms (about 400 grams)

• 2 small yellow onions

• 2 cloves of garlic

• 1 red bell pepper

• The zest from one lemon

• A handful of parsley

• Lots of spices like salt, black pepper, a mix of dried vegetables, paprika and soy sauce

• A tablespoon of vegetable oil

Making the mushroom gummy sauce

To save time and speed the all process, the first thing I do is to boil the pasta. As the water gets boiled, I start to cut all of the vegetables: onions, garlic, red bell pepper and mushrooms. Because I am at my parent’s house I use a type of wild mushrooms which we collect during the autumn from the forests surrounding our place, but you can add any kind of mushrooms.

In a non stick pan, a tablespoon of vegetable oil is heated up in which, at first, the onions, garlic, and pepper are slightly cooked for about 5 minutes or until a tasty scent begins to rise up.

To that I then add the cut mushrooms and stir fry everything for another 10 minutes or until the mushrooms have soften. At this point, the condiments are sprinkled over too, as well as the grated vegan cheese. I mix all the ingredients togheter to combine and I notice how the sauce gets pretty sticky and gummy, thus I pour more soy sauce over and let it cook until the cheese has melted.

Mixing everything together to combine

The pastas are are now soft and boiled, so I stroin the fusilli and penne. I pour over the pasta the mushrooms and cheese sauce and mix it very well to combine. I adjust the taste with the lemon zest, some more salt and soy sauce. I finish by adding the parsley which gives the dish a fresh air.

And the creamy vegan pasta is now ready to be served. This is actually the first time when I prepare the dish exactly just like I described it, thus I am really happy and satisfied with the result I got, so I highly recommend you to try out the recipe to get inspired by it and do it in your own style or with your own twist. Good luck and bon appetit! 

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