Now that we’ve perfected the jackfruit barbecue, James and I have been dying to shake up our jackfruit game and experiment with other applications. As it turns out, I just happened to have a recipe for a boeuf bourguignon that uses faux boeuf tips.

I decided to replace the fake meat with jackfruit and bake it into a pie (since we had leftover puff pastry)….as you well know, I like nothing better than a fat savoury pie. Now, this recipe is vegan, but not strictly WFPB (whole food/plant-based) because of a teensy bit of oil and, oh right…that puff pastry.

But just look at that fat pie!!

This turned out to be super succulent–a perfect vegan meal for Thanksgiving or Christmas!

So, here we go!

Savoury Portobello-Jackfruit Pie

Combine in a shallow bowl:

• 1/3 cup flour
• 1/2 tsp each salt and dried thyme
• 1/4 tsp each pepper and crushed dried rosemary

Add to the bowl and toss until jackfruit is coated:

• 3 cans young jackfruit in brine (with the hard bits and pods cut off–the amount of jackfruit will be reduced to 2/3 of the original amount)

Place a large pan on the stove set to medium heat. Add…

• 2 TBS vegetable oil
• the coated jackfruit and saute for a few minutes.

Return sauteed jackfruit back to bowl and cover.

Next, add the following to the pan and saute until the onion is transluscent:

• 1/2 cup onions, chopped
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 4 cups coarsely chopped portobello mushrooms (1-inch chunks)

Add:

• 2 1/2 cups water or veg stock
• 2 TBS Better Than Bouillon Vegetable Base

Bring to a boil and add:

• 1/2 cup dry red wine
• 1 TBS tomato paste

Mix together to form a slurry and drizzle into pan.

• 2 TBS flour
• 3 tbsp cold water

Heat to boiling, turn down to a simmer and stir until thickened.

Add the jackfruit and…

• 1 cup frozen peas

Simmer until thick, and adjust the seasonings if need be.

Meanwhile, prepare a puff pastry crust. Pour the jackfruit-portobello mixture into the crust, cover with top crust, and bake at 400 for 45 minutes.

The super manly hand belongs to James, who rolled out the pastry for me.

Bake at 400 for forty-five minutes, aaaand……just look at this delicious beauty!

I served it with air-fried new potatoes and grilled broccoli, and we both loved it!

And James was listening to Simon and Garfunkel’s The Concert in Central Park, and when I heard “Feelin’ Groovy” (which was one of the encores), I was reminded of the first time I heard the song back in 1967. I’m quite sure it was the Harper’s Bizarre version, which is even more poppy and upbeat than the Simon & Garfunkel version.

I was only ten years old, but the song made me feel inordinately optimistic about growing up. I’d never imagined my life as an adult until I heard this song because adulthood seemed like endless drudgery, but “Feelin’ Groovy” made adulthood seem liberating. I think I suddenly realized that as an adult, I would be able to do whatever I wanted. I know, it’s not exactly the theme of the song, but that’s how I interpreted it at the time. I also found “Georgy Girl” strangely uplifting–I thought it was a happy song about a carefree young woman “swinging down the street so fancy free”!! I must’ve blocked out all the lyrics about her “loneliness deep inside”!

And here’s The Seekers’ “Georgy Girl”–the upbeat tone really does work in contrast to the theme, so you can imagine my confusion as a child:

And since we’re on this theme, I may as well include the song that, two years later, would terrify me about growing up. I was twelve by that point and we’d just moved across the country from Montreal to Vancouver. I’d started babysitting and buying my own clothes and even bought myself a clock radio, so I was starting to feel very grown up. But the girls at my new school seemed much more adult than the twelve-year-olds I’d left behind in Montreal and certainly much more mature than I was–some of them smoked and even had furious necking sessions in the ravine with high-school boys.

And every morning for several months of grade seven, my clock radio would snap on with the song “Mama Told Me Not to Come” by Three Dog Night and I’d lie in bed listening to the words, terrified that one day very soon I’d be seduced against my will into taking drugs and drinking alcohol at some crazy hippy party: “That ain’t no way to have fun, son!”

And, of course, a few years later that did indeed happen, but by that time, it was fun…son.