Sausage Casserole with Dumplings

When I was a kid I always loved my mum's delicious dumplings on top of stews and chicken soup - they're such a warm and cozy comfort food-ish kind of thing. 

I think they taste great on casseroles too, especially rich, tomatoey ones like this one.  I like to use my Thermomix to prepare casseroles - the baking time is greatly reduced, which saves electricity (or gas), and the preparation time is much shorter too. 

I made up this casserole a couple of days ago using sausages, and we all loved it. (You could use meat balls, diced steak, etc, instead of sausages, but it may change the cooking times.)  The sauce is prepared and cooked in the Thermomix bowl, while the sausages steam on top in the Varoma, then it's placed in a casserole dish, the dumplings are prepared in the Thermomix, dropped on top, and it goes in the oven and cooks in no time.  Hope ya like it :)

1.  Place in Thermomix and chop on speed 5 for 3 seconds:
- 1 onion, halved
- 1 or 2 garlic cloves
- 2 carrots, quartered
- 1 celery stick, quartered
- 1 red capsicum, halved

2.  Add and cook at 100 degrees, 4 minutes, speed 1:
- 1 Tblspn sweet paprika, ground
- 30g olive oil or butter

3.  Add to bowl & chop on speed 5 for 5 seconds:
- 400g tomatoes, halved
- 2 Tblspns (or so) tomato paste
- 1 Tblspn vege stock paste
- 2 Tblspns balsamic vinegar
- 1 Tblspn Rapadura
- 200g water

4. Place Varoma on lid of bowl and place sausages inside:
- 700g thin beef sausages
(Space sausages apart to let steam through - see photo below - and place lid on top.)

5.  Cook on Varoma temperature for 20 minutes, reverse speed 1, or until sausages are cooked through.

6.  Cut sausages in quarters and remove to a large casserole dish.  Pour sauce over sausages and cover with lid or foil.  (Casserole shouldn't come above halfway up sides of dish, or it may overflow, like mine did!)  Turn on oven to 200 degrees C and place casserole dish in oven while you make the dumplings.  (Rinse and dry Thermomix bowl.)

Dumplings:

1. Grind grain in Thermomix bowl for 1 minute, speed 9:
- 200g spelt grain

2.  Add and process on speed 9 for 10 seconds:
- a large handful of fresh parsley

3.  Add and mix for 5 seconds, speed 5:
- 100g white spelt flour
- 4 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp fine sea salt

4.  Add and mix on speed 5 until just mixed:
- 180g rice-almond milk (or other milk)
- 60g oil (olive/macadamia/grapeseed)

5.  Take casserole out of oven and drop heaped tablespoonfuls of dough onto top (using a tablespoon and butter knife), cover with lid (or loosely with foil), making sure there's room for dumplings to rise, and return to oven. 

6.  Cook for 20 minutes then remove lid/foil and cook until done and lightly browned on top.  (Pull two dumplings apart in centre with forks to check if done.)

Enjoy!

(Oops, a little too full!)