Vegan Recipes for Thanksgiving

Are you hosting Thanksgiving this year, and vegan guests are attending? Or perhaps you are vegan and want to bring a plant-based dish that knocks everyone’s socks off. Maybe you just want to enjoy delicious and healthy food. We’ve got you covered with vegan recipes for Thanksgiving from The Happy Food Chef Robin Joy.

When Robin creates recipes for Planted Places, she keeps them clean. Robin uses very little oil and opts to sauté vegetables in water to make her dishes as healthy as possible. Find details about the water sauté method below (it’s encouraged by the American Heart Association).

Robin shared vegan recipes for Thanksgiving with Christy, the founder of Planted Places. You can watch a replay of their conversation and hear them talk about ingredient substitutions and other goodies. Robin’s dishes are very versatile, which is great if you have some ingredients that you need to use up.

Without further ado, here are Robin’s recipes for vegan mushroom risotto and no-cook cranberry sauce.

Vegan Mushroom Risotto

Most risotto recipes are made with arborio rice, which requires constant stirring. Robin’s giving us all a break in the kitchen by using short grain brown rice. Plus, brown rice is more nutritious than white rice. To mimic the creaminess of arborio rice, Robin adds mellow white miso.

In the video, Robin mentions that you can swap vegan cheese for nutritional yeast. If you’re okay with the recipe not being 100-percent plant-based, you can also use traditional parmesan cheese. Robin is a fan of the Sari Foods brand of nutritional yeast because it’s not fortified with extra ingredients. She also adds that it’s fine to sauté your veggies in butter or oil if you wish. Just note that butter isn’t vegan.

Vegan Mushroom Risotto
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Vegan Mushroom Risotto

Recipe by The Happy Food Chef Robin Joy

Ingredients

  • 1½ - 2 cups short grain brown rice

  • 5 cloves fresh garlic either pressed or minced

  • 1 red bell pepper diced

  • 1 large sweet onion diced

  • 1 package baby bell mushrooms

  • 1 bunch asparagus

  • ½ cup baby arugula optional

  • ½ cup fresh basil optional

  • ½ cup flat parsley optional

  • 2 tablespoons mellow white miso paste

  • 1 teaspoon dried Italian seasoning

  • 1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme cloves if available

  • 1 tablespoon chopped fresh oregano if available

  • 3 cup organic vegetable broth

  • ¼ to ½ cup Sari nutritional yeast

  • Salt and pepper to taste

Directions

  • Cook brown rice in vegetable broth. If you use 2 cups of rice use 3 cups of vegetable broth and 1 cup of water. While the rice is cooking prep veggies.
  • In a saucepan first water sauté the onion in ¼ cup of water and ½ the garlic. Add water if needed so the onion doesn’t stick to the pan. Then add some veggie broth, about ¼ cup, and add the peppers, asparagus, and garlic, and cook, adding veggie broth as needed so as not to stick to the pan.
  • Then add the mushrooms and cook. There should be a little broth in the pan to which you add the miso paste and mash the paste into the sauce to dissolve. This will thicken the sauce, if you need more liquid add some broth. Add the other seasonings and add any of your fresh greens to lightly wilt them and then remove from the heat.
  • At this point, most of the liquid is cooked off but still enough so there is lots of moisture in the veggies. You want to arrive at a similar consistency of risotto when you add the veggies to the rice, not too dry and not mushy and runny with liquid.
  • In a bowl place the cooked rice, put veggies on top, then the nutritional yeast, and very gently fold in the veggies and nutritional yeast into the rice. Salt and pepper to taste and serve!

Recipe Video

Notes

  • This mixture is great to use in stuffed peppers, baked into patties, and more!!!

No-Cook Cranberry Sauce

Most people are familiar with cooked cranberry sauce. However, Robin’s recipe is unique in that her sauce is raw. That means you can spend less time cooking. Robin tells us that her raw cranberry sauce takes two minutes to make. In addition to cranberries, it’s made with your choice of nuts, oranges and dates.

Raw Cranberry Sauce/Relish
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Raw Cranberry Sauce/Relish

Recipe by The Happy Food Chef Robin Joy

Ingredients

  • 1 12 oz bag organic cranberries

  • 1 tablespoon chopped fresh mint

  • 1 organic orange peeled and cut into chunks

  • 1 teaspoon orange zest

  • 10 Medjool dates with pits and then take out pits. Soak dates in warm water for 5 minutes to slightly soften if needed, not too soft

  • Pinch of salt

  • 2 tablespoons date sugar or maple syrup if needed

  • ¾ - 1 cup pecans or walnuts

  • 1-2 tablespoons Pomegranate juice or fresh-squeezed orange juice for a bit of added liquid if needed

  • Raw cacao nibs or dark chocolate chips optional

Directions

  • Place everything in a food processor and pulse to desired texture. Not smooth!
  • Place in a bowl and mix in 1 tablespoon chopped fresh mint. Adjust flavor at this point.
  • Put into a serving bowl and garnish on top with a few sprigs of mint.
  • Chill and serve!

Recipe Video

We hope you enjoy these vegan recipes for Thanksgiving from The Happy Food Chef Robin Joy. Happy Thanksgiving!

P.S. Check out our Holiday Gift Guide to kick off your holiday shopping, and be sure to download our free Winter Garden Guide below.