The Ultimate Vegan Thanksgiving Loaf (Gluten-Free)
Try this recipe for The Ultimate Vegan Thanksgiving Loaf Gluten-Free, or contribute your own.
Try this recipe for The Ultimate Vegan Thanksgiving Loaf Gluten-Free, or contribute your own.
- 3 cloves garlic minced
- 1 tsp salt
- black pepper to taste
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 1/4 cup dried cranberries
- 1/4 tsp oregano
- 2 tablespoons nutritional yeast
- 1/4 tsp thyme
- 1 cup cooked brown rice
- 1/2 onion, finely chopped
- 1 medium-large carrot grated
- 1 rib celery thinly sliced
- 1 1/2 cups kale shredded and tightly packed
- 1 1/2 cups mushrooms thinly sliced
- 1 cup overcooked green lentils
- 1/3 cup oat flour (or ground oats)
- 3 tbsp ground flax seed
- 1/2 cup ground walnuts
- 1/2 cup cranberry sauce canned or homemade (recipe below)
- Carbohydrate 24.4339485353535 g
- Cholesterol 0 mg
- Fat 11.601226142918 g
- Fiber 4.26289246460645 g
- Protein 5.5714059280303 g
- Saturated Fat 1.13565799119492 g
- Serving Size 1 1 Serving (83g)
- Sodium 11.5218718434392 mg
- Sugar 20.1710560707471 g
- Trans Fat 0.624598547986328 g
- Calories 212 calories
Step-by-step
- Cook your brown rice and lentils. The whole cooking process will go by much faster if you happen to have leftovers of either ingredient on hand, but cooking them fresh is perfectly fine too.
- Prep and chop all of your ingredients. Try to keep everything relatively small, your loaf will hold together better that way.
- Preheat your oven to 400°F.
- Heat 1 tbsp oil in a large frying pan and heat over medium-high. Once your frying pan is heated, add the onion, garlic, carrot, celery, and kale. Sauté until the onion starts to become translucent (about 2 minutes.)
- Add the mushrooms, oregano, thyme, salt and pepper and continue sautéing until everything is just tender.
- In a large bowl, combine the sautéed vegetables, brown rice, lentils, oat flour, ground flax seeds, nutritional yeast, walnuts, and cranberries.
- Mix everything VERY thoroughly. It's best to mix everything quite roughly so that you're mashing some of the ingredients together. This is really important for proper binding in this recipe.
- Firmly press the mixture into a parchment paper lined loaf pan or 9x9 cake pan.
- Bake for 25 minutes. Remove from oven, pour the glaze over the loaf and bake for another 10-15 minutes.
- Remove from oven and let sit for 10-15 minutes to fully set.
- In a high speed blender, blend cranberry sauce until completely smooth.
That single cup of overcooked green lentils listed in the ingredients is the absolute structural anchor of this entire dish, functioning essentially as a natural paste that holds every grain of brown rice and crumb of walnut together without requiring eggs or dairy. Mashing those legumes partially during the mixing phase is mandatory, because leaving them whole guarantees that slices will crumble apart the moment the carving knife touches them. Maintaining small, uniform dice sizes on the onions, carrots, and celery prevents structural weak points from forming inside the baking pan. When vegetables release moisture during the initial two-minute high-heat sauté in olive oil, drive off as much surface water as possible so excess liquid does not interfere with the oat flour and ground flax seed binders. Press the dense mixture forcefully into a parchment-lined loaf pan using the back of a measuring cup to eliminate internal air pockets that cause cracking during the twenty-five-minute bake at 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Letting the baked loaf rest undisturbed for fifteen minutes on a wire rack allows internal starches to gelatinize fully, yielding clean, stable slices rather than a messy heap. Pair this savory main with a bright, high-acid side dish like roasted Brussels sprouts tossed in lemon juice to cut through the rich density of the ground walnuts and nutritional yeast.
