Who wants currywurst?
March 5, 2010 in Allgemein
When it comes to fast food in Germany, currywurst aka sausage with curry sauce is always on top of the list. The sausage used for currywurst is usually a bratwurst (“fry sausage”) which is cut up and smothered with a curry-ketchup mixture. Yes, that’s right: curry-ketchup mixture is what we call curry sauce here in Germany.
Bratwurst smothered in sauce.
I probably had one currywurst in my whole life and never missed it. But when I was a kid, I really loved curry ketchup. Me and my sister refused to eat regular ketchup, so my father always had to buy a large bottle of curry ketchup when he went grocery shopping. It was probably only because of the curry sauce/ketchup that I wanted to veganize currywurst. I know, I could just have grabbed a bottle of curry ketchup. For those, who are not familiar with the whole bratwurst/currywurst/currysauce obsession, here’s a recipe.
Bratwurst (makes 4 sausages)
144 g (1 cup) gluten powder (vital wheat gluten)
10 g (2 tablespoons) chickpea flour
25 g (4 tablespoons) yeast flakes
2 teaspoons dried marjoram
1 teaspoon granulated onion
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 teaspoon salt
65 g (2.3 oz) smoked tofu
2 cloves garlic, minced
240 ml (1 cup) cold water
Preheat oven to 200°C (400°F). In a bowl, combine gluten, chickpea flour, yeast flakes, marjoram, granulated onion, black pepper, and salt. Mix well.
Mash tofu as finely as possible (or process into a paste using a food processor).
Add mashed tofu, garlic,and water to gluten mixture and knead until everything is well combined. Let rest for five minutes and knead again for 30 seconds.
Divide dough into four equal parts, form into logs (about 30 cm or 12 inches long) and tightly wrap in aluminium foil. Seal the edges by twisting the foil and bake for 25 minutes. Let cool completely before unwrapping.
Naked bratwurst
Currywurst (serves 4)
Heat a large pan and add 1 teaspoon of oil. Fry the sausages until brown and crispy. Meanwhile prepare the sauce in a small saucepan:
For the sauce:
250 g (1 cup) ketchup (use a sweet version)
60 ml (1/4 cup) water
1 tablespoon soy sauce
2 teaspoons mild curry powder
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
In a small saucepan, mix all the ingredients and cook sauce for 1 minute. Cut the sausages into bite size pieces and add to sauce. Stir and divide between four plates. Sprinkle with curry powder and serve with fries.
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Oh yum that looks so good and satisfying!
omg..omg…I can’t wait to try this! We haven’t done currywurst in a while because our market stopped carrying the good kind of vegan wurst (boca) and I was too lazy to make my own. Your recipe looks pretty easy so I’m going to give it a try. yay!!
I hate to admit this, but I didn’t like the vegan currywurst I had! Yours looks better though.
this looks delicious! thanks for posting :)
I made this last weekend for a vegan German dinner and it was a hit! There was even a meat eating German in attendance who confirmed that it tasted great.
Some how I think I messed up the amount of wet ingredients and ended up having to add a cup and a half of wheat gluten. And one of my Würstchen exploded out of it’s foil wrapper in the oven. But other than that everything went smoothly!
I am very sorry about the explosion incident! I hope it didn’t make a great mess. But glad you and your friends liked it and thank you for reporting back.
Nope, it didn’t make a mess at all! It only popped out in the middle, which just meant that I had three normal Wurst and one that was at a 90 degree angle :) When I cut it open there was a pretty big air bubble in the middle, so I must not have kneaded it enough/correctly.
Oh and I had a question. You’ve used liquid smoke in some of your recipes and by going through your archives it seems that you had a hard time buying it in Germany, and that you ended up buying smoked salt. I live in Berlin and have no idea where to look for either, do you have any advice?
Liquid smoke is available online in Germany and I’ve ordered some bottles a while ago. Search for BBQ stores or Mexican online stores, they usually carry it.
I bought smoked salt at Karstadt. They had different brands but you’ll want to make sure it doesn’t have any animal ingredients listed with the “Aroma”. I think I bought the “Spice Islands” brand. You can also order Rauchsalz/smoked salt online from “Bremer Gewürzhandel”.
Mihl! This looks amazing! I am excited to try it. We’ll let you know how it turns out…
Curry ketchup sounds… interesting in a not very tasty way :P But the sausages look so good. I’ve never thought about mixing tofu into a seitan sausage, how different is the texture?
Not much in this case. I mainly added the smoked tofu for flavour. In general it makes the texture softer.
Mmm mmm mmm. I don’t believe I’ve ever had currywurst or bratwurst in my pre-vegan days (I was a very picky, close-minded eater) but I would love to try this. I’m curious about the yeast flakes–would regular yeast do? I’m new to making vegan sausages. Thanks :-)
I was the same back in those days. Veganism makes us adventurous!
Yeast flakes are completely different from regular yeast. They are also called “nutritional yeast” and taste nutty and a bit like cheese.
I have most of the ingredients, but do you think I could sub out the chickpea flour and use un-smoked tofu (is this silken or what texture?)? I’m sure it won’t come out the exact same but I’ve been craving something like this and don’t have my big pot around to do steamed sausage.
You can probably leave out the chickpea flour alltogether.
Made this tonight and it was crazy delicious! So simple and quick to throw together and filling, yum! I had it with a side of mashed potatoes. Next time I will cut down on the cayenne pepper, though!
Thanks, Reilly! Glad you liked it.
Hi, I cooked your sausages today and they were delicious, but instead of baking them I steamed them. They were too tight and not very tender, do you have any clue why did it happen?
Hm, no. But I never tried steaming them. Sorry that happened!
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