Belgian Boulet à la Liégeoise, a vegan take on this traditional dish from the city of Liège. Vegan meatballs made with mushrooms and black beans in a rich sweet and sour sauce.
Serving Boulet à la Liégeoise
This dish is traditionally served with a generous portion of chips(fries). The delicious sweet and sour sauce is perfect for dipping your chips into.
Sirop de Liège
Sirop de Liège can be hard to find outside of Belgium, it’s a thick syrup made with pears and apples. Apple Butter is something similar and can be used if you are struggling to find Sirop de Liège. If you can’t source either, then pomegranate molasses can also be used to emulate the sweet and tangy flavour.
Vegan Belgian Meatballs (Boulet à la Liégeoise)
Belgian Boulet à la Liégeoise, a vegan take on this traditional dish from the city of Liège. Vegan meatballs made with mushrooms and black beans in a rich sweet and sour sauce.
Equipment
- Blender or food processor
Ingredients
Meatballs
- 2 tbsp milled flaxseed
- 2 tbsp water
- 1 small red onion
- 2 cloves garlic
- 200 g mushrooms
- 50 g oats
- 50 g breadcrumbs
- 1 can black beans drained and rinsed.
- 1 tbsp tomato paste
- Pinch Nutmeg
- Parsely
- Salt and black pepper to taste
Sauce
- ½ tablespoon olive oil
- 20 g butter
- 1 medium onion
- 2 cloves garlic
- 3 sprigs thyme
- 2 bay leave
- 2 cloves
- 3 tablespoons golden raisins
- 20 g brown sugar
- 1 tablespoon Sirop de Liège* substitute apple butter or pomegranate molasses
- 200 ml dark Belgian ale
- 30 ml red wine vinegar
- 200 ml vegan beef stock
- Salt and black pepper to taste
Instructions
Meatballs
- Add the milled flaxseeds and water to a bowl and mix to hydrate the flaxseeds. Set aside for 5 minutes.
- Preheat an oven to 180°C
- Roughly chop the onion and garlic and add to a blender or food processor. Clean and roughly chop the mushrooms and also add to the blender.
- Add the milled flax seeds when they have been sitting for at least 5 minutes together with the rest of the ingredients for the meatballs. Blend into a roughly homogeneous texture. Some lumps of mushrooms or beans are ok. The mixture should easily form into a ball when rolled in a spoon or in your hands.
- Wet your hand then roll the meatball mixture into 20 evenly sized meatballs using roughly a heaped tablespoon for each.
- Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and place the meatballs on it.
- Place in the centre of the preheated oven and bake for 25 to 30 minutes until golden all over. Turn the meatballs halfway through cooking.
Sauce
- Melt the butter with the oil in a pan over medium heat, once hot add the onion and sauté until soft and translucent, around 4 minutes. Add the minced garlic, thyme, bay leaves, and cloves and continue to cook for a further 1 minute.
- Add the raisins, brown sugar and Sirop de Liège and stir to combine everything. Continue to cook until the sugar coats the onions and is thick and sticky, around 2 minutes.
- Pour in the dark Belgian ale, stir to combine then bring to a gentle simmer. Continue to cook until the ale has reduced by half, around 5 minutes.
- Add the red wine vinegar and the vegan beef stock and continue to cook until reduced to a glossy thick sauce, around 5 minutes.
- Taste and adjust the seasoning. The amount of salt needed will depend on the salt levels in the vegan beef stock. Remove the sprigs of thyme, bay leaves and cloves before serving.
Boulet à la Liégeoise
- Once the meatballs and sauce are ready add the meatballs to the sauce and coat well. Serve with chips (fries).
Tried this recipe?Mention @mikeronm or tag #theveganplanetkitchen!
My meatballs held a lot of moisture. Should I have drained the black beans?
Hi Erica, sorry yes you should have drained the beans. We will make it more clear in the recipe. Thank you for trying the recipe and for the feedback.