This Moroccan chickpea & sweet potato stew with eggplant and couscous is one of my new favorite meals! It’s the perfect weeknight dinner: easy to make, healthy, and filling. As all the recipes on Vegan Heaven, it’s 100 percent plant-based. This Moroccan-inspired sweet potato and lentil stew is a new family favorite thanks to its warm and deliciously fragrant spices. It’s a fabulous Whole Food Plant Based recipe.
Serve it over whatever grain you like the best and you’re all set with a very nutritious and delicious dinner. I like it best with couscous, but it’s also great with bulgur, quinoa, or rice.
A Special Ingredient: Spiced Coconut Oil
I actually created this vegan sweet potato stew for a German company called Ölmühle Solling. They got tons of healthy oils, flour, spreads, and even some natural cosmetics. And they also have a huge variety of spiced coconut oil. It’s just like regular coconut oil but with lots of different spices. I haven’t seen anything like that before and was really looking forward to giving it a try. And I absolutely LOVED it! I got several flavors, but for the Moroccan sweet potato stew I used the one spiced with Ras el hanout. However, it’s best not to use it for frying but only for seasoning.
For those of you who haven’t heard of ras el hanout yet: it’s a popular spice mix from North Africa. It’s used for many savory dishes or even to season couscous and rice. It commonly contains cumin, nutmeg, cinnamon, clove, allspice, and turmeric.
As you can see in the picture, it’s not white like regular coconut oil but yellow or even orange. It’s such a great blend for North African recipes. And I absolutely love the smell of this coconut oil! Sooo good! You actually hardly need to add more spices when you use this ras el hanout coconut oil. I added more cinnamon and cumin for the sweet potato stew, but usually the flavor is strong enough. Especially when you use it for couscous or rice. However, I added quite a lot of veggies and diced tomatoes, so I seasoned it with some more spices.
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For those of you who can’t get hold of this spiced coconut oil: You can still make this chickpea and sweet potato stew. No problem at all! Just use regular coconut oil or any other kind of oil to sauté the onion and then either add ras el hanout or add the spices by themselves. Here’s a helpful recipe for making your own ras el hanout spice mix.
But if you live in Europe, you should really give this spiced coconut oil a try.
Moroccan Sweet Potato and Chickpea Soup || Vegan
Moroccan Sweet Potato Stew Recipe
Ingredients:
- 1 large onion, finely minced
- 1 carrot, finely minced
- 1 - [14.5 oz.] can of diced tomatoes, undrained
- 1 cup of red lentils, rinsed
- 2 cups cubed sweet potatoes
- 4 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 teaspoon ground cumin
- 1 teaspoon ground coriander
- ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon ground cloves
- ½ teaspoon smoked paprika
- ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper (optional)
- 8 cups vegetable broth (or water)
- 1 teaspoon sea salt (or to taste)
- ½ teaspoon black pepper (or to taste)
- 5 oz baby spinach, fresh
- ¼ cup fresh cilantro, chopped
Instructions:
- In a large ceramic/enamel-lined Dutch oven or similar stock pot, add the finely minced onion and carrot; sauté over medium heat until they begin to soften, approximately 4 to 5 minutes.
- Add all the other the remaining ingredients to the Dutch oven, except the baby spinach and cilantro, bring to boil, then immediately lower to a simmer.
- Simmer uncovered over medium-low heat for 45 minutes.
- Test the flavors, add more spices (see recipes notes), if necessary, to achieve the level of flavor you desire.
- Add the spinach and raisins and cook for another 5 minutes.
- Taste and adjust seasonings.
- Serve over couscous and top with vegan yogurt or sour cream as well as some fresh cilantro.
Additional Tips and Notes:
- Vegetable Broth/Water Ratio: Use Pacific Organic Vegetable Broth. We love this brand because it is Whole Food Plant Based compliant, as it does not contain MSG, has no oil, and does not contain any highly-processed ingredients; however, this brand of vegetable broth does have a strong flavor so less broth is required when compared to the water ratio. We use a higher water to broth ratio because of this. If you use another brand of vegetable broth, then adjust the water/vegetable broth ratio accordingly. For example, if you are using a very mellow vegetable broth, you might consider 6 cups of vegetable broth and 2 ½ cups of water for this recipe.
- Spices: You can control the spice level and heat level on this recipe. We have included the minimum spice amount to get a hint of the Moroccan flavors. This will allow you to introduce Moroccan flavors to family members who may have not tried the Moroccan cuisine and would love to experience it. However, if you really want to spice things up, you can easily increase the spice amounts indicated in the recipe, or add additional spices to adjust this recipe to meet your own spice preferences; however, be careful, as sometimes when you add too much spice, the flavors start to compete with one another and you end up with a bitter note to your dish.
- Water Amount: Use 7 cups to achieve a more thicker stew, and conversely use 8 cups if you are looking to have a less thick stew.
Chris and Katie love Moroccan food. Katie has a friend from Morocco who makes super delicious tagines and stews. They are always raving about her culinary wizardry.
What is so nice about this recipe is, it makes a lot so you are ensured some leftovers for lunch (or dinner) the next day and the flavor develops even more. We were so thrilled with this dish the day we made it that it was hard to imagine it could taste even better the next day. But, it DID!
Let me tell ya, I fell in love with this dish after the first bite. It is bursting with flavor and the texture is the perfect stew consistency. Top it with cilantro for the ultimate tasting experience!
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If you like this recipe, please leave a good rating!
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tags: #Moroccan
