Stories from the Cupboard: Feature No. 2 ---- Vegetable Pastel

Happy Sunday to all! What's so special about this Sunday? Well, my husband and I are celebrating our 23rd wedding anniversary today and that makes today a special day! Today also, I baked bread for the Lord's Table which we celebrate every first Sunday of the month in our church. In baking the bread, I use the recipe in making pie crust. So I prepared extra ingredients for the Vegetable Pastel I had in mind. It has been quite some time since I last cooked this menu. The first time I did, I remember my family and friends liked it. So Vegetable Pastel here I come!

Remember one of my posts in July entitled,  "Stories from the Cupboard: Feature No. 1 --- My Kitchenmates" (click here to view post). In that post, I featured about some of my favorite recipes using Del Monte Kitchenomics. Vegetable Pastel is one of the recipes of Del MonteKitchenomics.

This is the original Vegetable Pastel recipe of Del Monte Kitchenomics.

Ingredients:

20 g (20 g)	garlic, crushed
50 g (50 g)	medium onion, sliced
150 g (150 g)	medium carrot, sliced
200 g (150 g)	gabi, sliced
150 g (150 g)	singkamas, diced
100 g (100 g)	mushrooms, sliced
50 g (50 g)	medium red bell pepper, cut into squares
250 g (250 g)	DEL MONTE Original Style Tomato Sauce
415 g (415 g)	vienna sausage, drained and sliced

0.2 g (0.2 g)	laurel leaf
14 g (14 g)	margarine
17 g (17 g)	all purpose flour
79 g (79 g)	evaporated milk
1/4 cup	water
28 g (28 g)	cooking oil
2.3 g (2.3 g)	iodized fine salt
0.75 g (0.75 g)	pepper

Procedure:

 

1. WHITE Sauce: Melt margarine. Add flour while stirring. Remove from heat. Add milk-water mixture gradually while stirring. Cook over low heat for 5 minutes or until thick. Set aside.

2. SAUTÉ garlic, onion and vegetables except bell pepper. Add 3/4 cup water, 1/3 tsp iodized fine salt (or 1 tsp iodized rock salt), 1/4 tsp pepper and laurel leaf. Cook for 10 minutes.

3. ADD DEL MONTE Tomato Sauce and Vienna sausage. Cook for another 10 minutes. Add bell pepper and white sauce. Allow to simmer. Top with grated cheese if desired.

For my own version of Vegetable Pastel, here are some modifications I made. First, I didn't use singkamas and gabi (these were not available at the moment, and besides, nobody in my family likes gabi very much). 

Second, after step #3, I transferred the dish into a round foil pan lined with pie crust.

Third, I forgot to add the grated cheese before covering the pan with the top crust.
 

And finally, here's my Vegetable Pastel. Very much like a pie, yes, because the original version of this dish is said to be baked where the stew is placed in a pie crust.

Oh, I also ventured on a new recipe called Strata but I don't think there's still room for that in here. That gives me every reason to post another one in a day or two.

Meantime, have a productive week ahead!

Related Post:

Uncover the Strata