“Bacon” Wrapped Stuffed Dates
Many moons ago when Marie’s kids were younger, they came to visit me in California. We went for tapas and they served this absolutely delicious dish of sausage stuffed dates wrapped in bacon. Now that we are keeping mainly raw and vegan we thought this morsel was out of our lives forever. Silly us, all we had to do is wait for Marie to make her raw mushroom sausage and viola!
When I was experimenting and made the coconut bacon I also experimented with rice paper. It came out great, but wasn’t right for the recipe I originally made it for. The coconut wasn’t right for these stuffed dates because I couldn’t get strips wide and long enough to wrap around them. It’s all an experiment, sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn’t. This time it did. So even if you can cut the coconut thin, wide and long enough, I would still use the rice paper, but it’s up to you.
The most important experiment in all this was the syrup. I know that sounds weird but it’s because the discovery of making a raw syrup has recipe implications that will far exceed these stuffed dates. I use syrups for everything, but normally I would just leave them sitting out to get to room temp. The result would be too runny for what I usually want, but it works when incorporating it into another item. With this I will be able to do all kinds of reductions including my own raw fruit infused vinegar (I’m so making that!).
RAW VEGAN RECIPE: “Bacon” Wrapped Stuffed Dates with Pomegranate Syrup
One dozen soft dates (I used Medjools)
2 mushroom sausage patties
3 rice paper wrappers
pomegranate syrup
bacon marinade
Prepare syrup the night before.
Remove the seed from the dates by slicing lengthwise and stuff with the mushroom sausage patties (one patty will usually fill 6 dates).
Wrap marinated rice paper around dates. Place fold side down onto silicone sheet and place into the dehydrator for 2 hours at 118 degrees. Turn them over and dehydrate for an additional 2 hours. The wrap should be crispy. Drizzle syrup over before serving.
Pomegranate Syrup
Juice one pomegranate
2 tblsp raw sugar
Mix ingredients together and let sit, mixing occasionally until sugar has dissolved (usually about a half hour in a warm kitchen). Mix again and place in a heat safe bowl at 118 degrees overnight in the dehydrator or about 10 hours.
“Bacon” Marinade
3 tblsp raw organic Shoyu sauce
2 1/2 tblsp Liquid Smoke *
1 1/2 tblsp maple syrup
healthy pinch of onion powder
1/8 tsp smoked paprika
healthy pinch of garlic powder
Mix liquid and powdered ingredients well. Place bacon marinade in a large round plate and put rice paper sheets in one at a time for about 3-5 seconds on each side. With a very sharp knife carefully cut into half inch strips (no worries if you mess it up, once finished no one will be able to tell).
