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Ever since my vegan keto smoked salmon recipe from the other day, I have a serious hankering for some vegan seafood. Even more so, I had a craving for fish tacos. As I’m sure a lot of you have discovered, there really aren’t good vegan fish substitutes that are readily available (or inexpensive). Even more so, the ones that do exist are in no way low carb. So, in order to be able to enjoy a low carb vegan fish taco, I was clearly going to have to make them myself.
I decided to enlist the help of hearts of palm in the creation of these taco wonders. They’re mostly ignored on the salad bar, but actually taste quite pleasant in place of fish here. For sour cream, I decided to make one out of hempseeds instead of buying a heavily processed vegan sour cream from the store. Using the hempseeds added some omega-3s and a lot of protein to the mix as well!
These tacos are made with soy sauce and chili powder, so clearly not in the traditional taco flavor profile, but they’re certainly a welcome change! I’ll definitely be making other variations of this in the future.
Notes About Making Low Carb Vegan Fish Tacos with Hempseed Sour Cream:
- You could use a store-bought vegan sour cream (hah, I’m starting to sound like Ina Garten), but making your own from hempseeds is seriously simple and adds in some omega-3s
- I consider a “serving” of the hempseed sour cream here to be about 3 tablespoons, because despite what is happening in the picture, that’s about how much of the stuff I used.
- This recipe makes enough for 2 good-sized servings of vegan “fish” tacos, but you can double the recipe easily, and it will taste awesome as well.
- You don’t actually have to heat the hearts of palm, since they’re already cooked, but I like to because I feel like it does actually make things taste better!
Low Carb Vegan Chili “Fish” Tacos With Hempseed Sour Cream
Ingredients
For the Hempseed Sour Cream:
- 1 cup hulled hempseeds
- 1/4 cup lemon juice
- 1/4 cup water
- pinch of salt
For the Fish
- 1 can of Hearts of Palm drained, rinsed and chopped
- 1/2 tsp sriracha or chili paste
- 2 tbsp tamari soy sauce or liquid aminos
- 1/2 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tbsp sesame oil
Taco Fixings
- Romaine lettuce boats for taco shells or, whatever shell you want to use
- about a 1/4 cup total of shredded purple cabbage
- 1 scallion
- 1 lime
- kelp flakes optonal
Instructions
- In a medium mixing bowl, add roughly chopped hearts of palm, soy sauce, garlic powder and chili paste/sriracha. Toss until thoroughly combined, and put to the side.
- To make the hempseed sour cream, add all ingredients to a blender and process until smooth. You may need to add a little more water to get the right texture. Set the sour cream aside when finished.
- In a saucepan on low heat, pour in the sesame oil and add in the hearts of palm mixture. Sautee until everything is warm, and the excess liquid has been absorbed, around five minutes.
- Wait for the hearts of palm to cool a bit and then assemble your little lettuce tacos by layering the fish, cabbage, sour cream and scallions. For a little extra flavor from the sea, sprinkle some kelp flakes over the hearts of palm before adding the other toppings. Squeeze lime juice on top to finish.
I just made these for lunch, and they were super tasty!