Please talk to me about a vegetarian Christmas

[misson]

Just that really. I admit that for me Christmas food does have meat and fish as a focal point. Will be doing all that plus vegetarian this year.

I would like to offer a meat free alternative to turkey that goes with all the (meat free) trimmings. Am also looking for meat free buffet ideas.

My main problem so far has been finding something that won't taste out of place with roasties, sprouts and breadsauce.

Ohhh i will keep a watch on this thread. I saw a recipe for sage butter basted cauliflower cheese that looked amazing recently. Will try and find it.

You can get quorn fillets in lemon and pepper coated breadcrumbs, which I have had before, and it goes very nicely with the usual trimmings. Also, I have had quorn scotch eggs.

Chestnut tart is nice and fyi bisto is suitable for vegetarians.

Big mushroom with Stilton cooked in the oven or grill. If you really want to push the boat out put a bread crumb and mature cheddar topping on it. Goes great with cranberry source and it's extremely easy.

If your vegetarian guests will eat Quorn, they make a 'roast' which you cook for around an hour. You can slice this up (as you would with chicken or turkey) and add all the trimmings. Or, you can buy 'turkey and stuffing' style slices.

I love a veggie christmas dinner with all the trimmings - roasties, parsnips, mini (veggie) sausages, cranberry sauce, loads of green veg, bread sauce, etc.

For buffets, loads of stuff. If you don't want to cook look at the party selections M&S and/or Waitrose offer. They're not all crammed with goats cheese or red pepper! :)

Love the idea of cauliflower cheese. Will check out the Quorn section at Tesco too.

Chestnut tart sounds lovely, not sure if it would be too similar to chestnut stuffing (my mum's favourite ) though.

Mushroom with Stilton sounds yummy too.

What Marklah said. We did the quorn roast last year and even my carnivorous DF didn't realise until we told him after that it was meat free roast.

The very best is Delia's parsnip roulade, from her Christmas book. It's amazingly good.

I also really like her mushroom choux pastry thing.

I've been vegetarian for 20 years, and this year I'm having a mushroom, spinach and leek filo pie. Previously I made a mushroom Wellington which was lovely, and a spinach, mushroom and ricotta roulade. I would steer clear of nut roasts, and the Quorn offerings are poor in comparison to a nicely made dish.

For a buffet, I like anti-pasti, cheeses, breads, salads. You could offer quiche depending on whether they eat eggs or not. There's so many options to make it enjoyable!

I get the quorn 'family roast' remove the film and wrap in stuffing and puff pastry. It's can then just go with all the normal veg and veggie gravy.

I make an amazing mushroom and chestnut nut roast if I do say so myself but it's way more effort and the kids refuse to touch it.

This might not be necessary to say but have you tried Nigelas Apple Mincemeat. It is really tasty, nicer than jar mincemeat and free from suet

Vegetarian food is all about personal preference - I generally dislike meat substitutes but a lot people love them. I like a nut roast or an onion tart but they make other people run for the hills .

If you cook there is a BBC Vegetarian recipe magazine out at the moment , and of course there's the website. However, I think veggies can be well catered for these days if you don't have the time to cook from scratch. The usual big supermarkets will do lots of festive food that doesn't contain meat. Try and think seasonal/ festive flavours for a vegetarian main such as cranberry, chestnuts, root vegetables and butternut squash, blue cheese or goats cheese. You can usually find these as a pie/wellington/tatin/en croute that will go well with the usual Christmas dinner trimmings.

A few ideas for a buffet might be a lovely baked Brie with French bread and veggies to dip. We all love Indian food at home so veggie samosas and pakoras goes down well. Tapenade on crostini is nice and of course there's lots of different hummus out there now. My lot also love halloumi and goats cheese and you can make little canapés from these. Homemade parmesan cheese 'straws' from a sheet of puff pastry, egg wash and grated Parmesan. Finally, a big platter of veggie antipasto - marinated olives, peppers, tomatoes, mini mozzarella, bread sticks might go down nicely. Hope this helps.

*crosspost on the antipasto, sorry!

Thanks all. Have had a chat with my sister and he doesn't do meat substitutes.

Want to avoid chestnuts (love them but will be in the stuffing and don't want him to think I just made him extra stuffing).

Will have a think about stuffed mushrooms. Will also look up Delia on line and hadn't even thought of bbc website.

Buffet sounds like my normal stuff, minus the cold meat and pork pie. So am happy with that too.

I've done savoury tart tatins (onion or beetroot) before which went down extremely well.

www.deliciousmagazine.co.uk/recipes/caramelised-onion-tarte-tatin/

This is the recipe for the onion one.

I can't stand quorn. Love a good nut roast as it goes really well with Xmas trimmings. . For crispy potatoes do them in a mix of oil and real butter.

Another vote for nut roast! Butternut squash and almond, or cranberry and pecan. Served with all the usual trimmings-especially extra crunchy hassleback potatoes and sprouts with chestnuts. Yum!

Cranks do lovely vegetarian recipes, quality stuff. I know you don't want chestnuts (came on here to say 'do the chestnut and cashew nut roast!!' which I've done at Christmas before) but they have loads of good ones eg christmas mushroom pie

[[http://plantbasedfamilydownunder.com/2013/12/09/cashew-and-mushroom-nut-roast/]]
With [[this
MushroomSherrySauce.htm!]]

I don't like meat substitutes either. I vote for either a nut roast, or this Delia strudel which tastes amazing and I have almost every Xmas along with all teh veggies and trimmings that everyone else is having.
www.deliaonline.com/recipes/collections/easy-entertaining/oven-roasted-ratatouille-and-mozzarella-strudel-with-parmesan-and-pecans

Bugger.
Google Sarah Brown cashew and mushroom roast and Sarah Brown mushroom and sherry sauce. Also have a look at Sprouts a la brigoule.

Tesco have a frozen festive vegetarian wellington - might be easy? We have one as we are veggies

m.tesco.com/h5/groceries/r/www.tesco.com/groceries/product/details/?id=289820831

I just remembered the wonderful Fennel Walnut and Gorgonzola Soufle Tart from Sarah Ravens Christmas book. It's basically caramelized fennel, walnuts and cheese in a tart, with a roux based sauce. It's utterly delicious.