Gratitude for a Vegan Thanksgiving
This year, I was lucky enough to be able to have a completely vegan Thanksgiving for my first big holiday after becoming vegan. I understand most vegans are not so fortunate. I am blessed to have parents who went vegan with me. And since we celebrated at their house, I was able to enjoy a totally vegan meal!
My mom and I cooked oil-free vegan versions of some of the usual Thanksgiving suspects and added a few new dishes. The thing is, there is nothing special about vegan food. Vegan food is just food. We simply left the animals and animal products out. Looks pretty good, eh?
For us, since my parent’s biggest motivation to eat this way is health related, we also went for a whole food plant based meal. In other words, we tried to use foods in a state as close to the way they came out of the ground. That meant on top of no animal products, we also did not use any oil or other highly refined products such as refined flour or sugar. We did use a little bit of maple syrup, and some minimally processed foods such as almond butter, whole grain bread, whole grain flour, and tofu.
So while we could have used vegan alternatives like vegan cheese and vegan butter to make all our favorite dishes taste the same as they would traditionally, we opted for the more wholesome route. This way we could eat more and feel better doing it. No food comas or food hangovers for us! It’s amazing how amazing you can feel eating tons of food when you leave the animals and processed stuff off the plate.
All the Potatoes!
So what did we eat? We had three types of potatoes, of course. Mashed potatoes and cauliflower was a hit! Nobody would’ve even known about the cauliflower if we hadn’t mentioned it.
My favorite has always been a cheesy potato and cornflake casserole known by many names, but we call “party potatoes.” We made a whole food vegan version, which definitely tasted different, but I personally loved it. It was still my favorite. I used to eat mounds of the stuff and always regretted it as I felt terrible after. But this time I was able to eat mounds of it with zero regrets.
We did splurge a little with our sweet potato casserole, opting for a mashup of two different versions. We used a pecan, oat, crumble topping, with a few vegan marshmallows sprinkled in. These vegan marshmallows were probably the most processed, least healthy item on the table. But perfection is not necessary for good health, so a little treat here and there is ok in my book. Especially when you primarily eat whole food vegan most of the time.
Some other Traditional Dishes
Next up we made a green bean casserole. This was ok, but the sauce needs a little work. Our blender was not quite up to the task, so the texture was not where we wanted it. Time to spring for a Vitamix, I think!
For the topping we used a combo of thinly sliced onions and thinly sliced and seasoned soy curls toasted in the oven until crispy. We made the mistake of toasting them the day before though, so they got a little soggy. Would have been better if we did it the day of or used the broiler when we reheated the whole casserole.
Ultimately though, we realized nobody in our family really loves green bean casserole anyway, so in the future we may just enjoy straight up green beans instead.
Another classic dish that we need to work on a bit was the dressing. The flavor was ok, but I think it needed a bit more seasoning. I think this is the only dish that really suffered because of the lack of oil or butter alternative. We could have used a vegan butter to make it taste the same as our old favorite, but personally, I don’t think it’s worth the food hangover. We decided this would have been better toasted a little bit longer to get crispier and also topped with some gravy.
Speaking of gravy, our mushroom gravy was one of the fan favorites.
We had some creamed corn which was pretty good.
And of course, you gotta have some bread, so we made whole wheat rolls.
For a couple of our family members, it wouldn’t be Thanksgiving without cranberry jelly from a can, which I was surprised to see is actually vegan! Not exactly whole food, but again, a little treat is ok.
Non-Traditional Items
Those were all our traditional items and then we had a few more dishes to round everything out. This is actually one of our accidentally vegan dishes that we’ve been having for several years now. It is a whole wheat pasta salad with chickpeas, peppers, tomatoes, black olives, purple onions, and an Italian-style dressing. The only change we made this year was to make an oil-free dressing.
Then we added mini lentil loaves, which I really liked. I’m not sure how everyone else felt about them, but it was another one of my favorites. I am a little obsessed with lentils though.
And finally a barley and roasted carrot and brussels sprouts salad with green onions, fresh parsley, and a balsamic and orange dressing. I loved this one, but the conclusion was the brussels sprouts were not for everyone. We’re thinking about swapping those for roasted broccoli instead.
Dessert
And then of course we had to have dessert! I didn’t get a picture of every dessert, but we had three options. The first were chocolate chip cookie dough balls. Next was a pecan bar that was sort of like a pecan pie, but was a completely whole food dessert, using dates for the sticky sweet layer instead of corn syrup…so good! Finally, of course, the pumpkin pie.
Conclusion
So as you can see, vegan food is just food. It is absolutely possible to have a vegan Thanksgiving and still stuff yourself silly. But when it’s whole food vegan, you can be thankful for also feeling great throughout the day. And hopefully you like your family because you won’t be inclined to have your afternoon nap after this energizing meal, so you might have to endure more time with your relatives!
If you want to learn more about starting a vegan diet, check out my Resources page.
