What did one vegetarian say to the other? “We have to stop meat-ing like this.” Okay, the joke’s pretty lame, but the line of meat alternatives known as Match isn’t. This St. Louis company combines plant-based proteins into products resembling Italian sausage, ground beef, ground chicken and other items. They’re available in the freezer section of various grocers around town and cook up just like their more traditional counterparts. Depending on the particular product, you can grill, sauté or roast them to your heart’s content.
The products are particularly helpful in “blended” families. The omnivores still want meat in their pasta sauce, but the vegetarians can’t stomach it. To solve this dinner dilemma, just sauté the onions, garlic and other vegetables, then divide into two pans, adding Match Italian sausage to one pan and traditional sausage to the other. Then add your tomatoes and other seasonings and continue cooking each pan in the traditional manner and voilà – everyone’s happy. This technique will also work for chili, soups, tacos or sloppy Joes.
Once the warm weather decides to stay around for a while, you can even use Match ground beef for hamburgers on the grill. That will leave you plenty of time to work on your jokes.
Match Meats are available in various grocers around town, but we found ours at Dierbergs in Brentwood.
This article appears in February 2011.