Deciding on a delicious vegan or vegetarian Thanksgiving dish can be difficult. When creating a menu for yourself, friends or family members, it can be challenging to include something for everyone.
While tofurky isn’t a crowd favorite for many, there’s still endless options for creating your plant-based table this year. By adding an alternative for the main course or some traditional sides, you’ll be making sure everyone has their plate full. Here’s six veggie based dishes for Thanksgiving:
Breaded Thanksgiving cauliflower steaks
Cauliflower steaks are simple to prepare and easy to serve. If you need more space in the kitchen, make the “steaks” before hand and reheat in the oven. The breading adds the perfect crunch to the vegetable making it an ideal main dish.
Something so versatile as cauliflower is perfect for a day like Thanksgiving. The recipe uses a whole head, but if there are more meat eaters than not, feel free to cut the recipe in half and use the other half of the head in other dishes.
Potato-leek soup
Something everyone loves about Thanksgiving is the potatoes. So, why not add this soup to the mix? Serving a plant-based soup for your vegan and vegetarian friends is a perfect way to include them at the table.
Whether it is the main dish or just a small side, soup is easy to make and a good addition to the table. Guests can add their leftover meat to the soup for the days following Thanksgiving. It’s a win, win!
Individual vegetable pot pie and biscuits
Pot pie is an amazing way to sneak in some vegan/vegetarian recipes to the menu. This recipe does you a solid by adding biscuits to the top of the pot pie and killing two birds with one stone. Even better, the dish is small enough to also serve as a side dish.
The recipe is sure to be a hit with everyone at the table, and nobody will be able to tell its vegan. For the others at the table, you could double the batch of biscuits and serve it at the table.
Vegan mushroom gravy
Along with potatoes, everyone loves a good, home cooked gravy. This recipe only has five ingredients, so it's simple enough to make while waiting for other things to finish cooking. It’s a flawless replacement or addition to the traditional gravy. The mushrooms provide a hearty flavor to anything on the table.
If you or your guests do not like mushrooms, feel free to switch out the recipe for a more traditional gravy. It only takes five minutes and is smoother because of the lack of mushrooms. Either way, having a vegan option of gravy at the table is mandatory.
Vegan stuffing
Ditch the box made stuffing for a stellar homemade one. All that is needed to make it vegetarian-friendly is to remove the chicken or turkey stock. Substituting the poultry stock allows you to introduce more flavors to the dish.
Feel free to add leftover veggies from other dishes to this side to tie them all together and produce less waste this holiday. It’ll definitely be something all of the guests will be raving about.
Oven roasted potatoes
Since everyone loves mashed potatoes at Thanksgiving, why not switch it up with roasted ones? The untraditional potato side at your table removes the need of cream and butter that mashed potatoes need.
Roasting potatoes is quick and easy, while producing a crunchy outside and creamy inside. Bonus: you can add any dressing to spark up the flavor profile. Your vegan guests will appreciate them because of the lack of dairy, and your kitchen will love you for only making one potato dish instead of two separate mashed ones.
