A Vegetarian Christmas
Being a vegetarian at Christmas can be hard, especially if you’re like me and love the taste and smell of meat but simply choose not to eat it because of your own beliefs. The temptations come in many forms and are frequently being offered to me, daring me to crack in the face of such lovely food. However, there are plenty of fantastically festive vegetarian meals out there and I’m going to talk about a few of my favourites which are all perfect for Christmas. Many of the recipes are on the BBC’s Good Food website, it’s a great place to get ideas for vegetarian and non-vegetarian meals.
The first dish is a Moroccan spiced pie, its a great festive dish due to its colourfulness and spicy flavour. The recipe is provided BBC Good Food. It only takes 35 minutes to cook and can serve up to 6 people so it’s a good thing to have if you’re serving a lot of guests. Prep can take up to one and half hours but it’s definitely worth it!
Moroccan Pie. Source: MizD! on flickr.com
If you’re looking for something a little more traditional but not too plain then look no further than the Parsnip, Cranberry and Chestnut loaf. Its a great modern twist on the normal nut loaf and is certainly festive in its use of cranberries. Prep is only 30 minutes and it takes 1 hour and 30 minutes to cook. It’s a lot easier to make than the spiced pie but in my opinion it isn’t as exciting. The recipe is provided by the BBC Good Food page.
Cranberry loaf. Source: Sean Dreilinger on flickr.com
I think it looks more suited to Christmas but I believe that the pie is the tastier of the two. Obviously, I’m basing the Christmas look off the picture shown above. Mine didn’t come out quite to that standard but cooking isn’t exactly a major strong point of mine!
The third dish I’d like to share is Crusty Mediterranean parcels. I had them for Christmas last year and if you cook them right like my Mother did, it’s excellent. I’m sure if I attempted it, the meal may be described as more of a disaster rather than a festive dish. The recipe is provided by bestrecipes1.com. These parcels are great for large groups of people as you can make as many of them as you like. The recipe suggests using Gruyere cheese so make sure to check it’s vegetarian before using it as sometimes it isn’t (mostly is in Britain).It’s very easy to make and also healthy!
The last dish I’m going to talk about is a layered squash, barley and spinach pie. I have only tasted this and haven’t had any experience in actually cooking it, however, it is absolutely delicious and I had to mention it. Its quite a tricky one to make and will involve some effort but the end result is brilliant! It looks like the type of dish you’d expect to see on a fake dinner table in some cheesy Christmas film. It’s very at home in the festive environment and goes really well with the mountains of other Christmas food on your plate. Prep time is roughly about 40 minutes and it takes 2 hours and 40 minutes to cook. The link to the recipe is here.
Spinach pie. Source: roboppy on flickr.com
Vegetarian or not, these dishes are brilliant and are certainly worthy competitors to the roasted Turkey and other meats. They’ll ensure vegetarians enjoy the Christmas meal just as much as everyone else and they’ll also allow people to try things that are new and exciting!
Beautiful photographs, great article. I was just today trying to figure out where to start with our first vegan Christmas! This article came just in time!!! THANK YOU!!!
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