VEGAN ROAST ‘TURKEY’
WARNING! Everything you see here is 100% vegan.
That means the delicious orange & sage stuffing, the ‘turkey’ style meat, the rice paper skin and it definitely includes the honey-mustard style glaze to go on top. This roast skips the seitan and hours upon hours of preparation, with the longest parts of this recipe being the parts where you can leave something to simmer or bake and go have a drink.
Sunday roasts? Sorted. Thanksgiving? Done. Christmas? Look no further. Enjoy this masterpiece of a plant based centrepiece that’ll wow anyone, probably piss a couple of people off and please everyone lucky enough to be served a bite.
This Bird Roast is not shaped like poultry. It’s me! A roasted Zacchary Bird! Have your favourite vegan cookbook author for Christmas lunch instead!
So you want to make a vegan roast turkey. You’ve come to the right place because I’m The Vegan Butcher and this is kind of my bag, baby. I’ve designed plant based meat products for supermarkets for half a decade now, from gluten free chicken-style roasts to gluten-loaded seitan hams enjoyed across Australia. They range from vague, blob-like roasts to full plant based re-workings of a dead bird.
Why make it look like a turkey?
Because vegans don’t go vegan because they hate flavour, and they certainly don’t go vegan because they really want to miss out on family traditions on festive holidays. Put simply: why not? When you can enjoy the flavours you miss, the textures you love and the familiar, welcoming sight you grew up seeing on your table all without involving a real turkey. Everybody wins!
The Maple-Bourbon Fauxducken (pictured above) from The Vegan Butcher cookbook is a love letter to soy beans in three forms, shaped like a bird.
I can also confess that part of why I love making this roast look like a realistic turkey is also just to flex just how versatile plant based alternatives are. It invites people to consider the fact that you can truly replace anything you think you’d miss on a plant based diet! Ever heard someone say “I would go vegan, but I would miss XYZ too much”. This recipe exists to show those people that they can have their plant based cake.. and eat it, too. When choosing vegan, you’re not being asked to compromise your palate. It might take a little more effort to make a whole turkey, but it’s worth it to enjoy the flavours without hurting a turkey to do so.
Where do I find the plant based dry chicken mix?
The whole recipe is based on an emerging product style of plant based dry mixes (made up of starches, flavours, textured vegetable protein) that you mix liquid into and shape as you like. This uniquely gives us the ability to make specific shapes like a turkey. Seitan makes great roasts but because of the nature of gluten, means they’re harder to form into intricate shapes like these mixes do.
This originally was made with a gluten free product that I designed that’s unfortunately no longer available, but I have tested (and made a fabulous video with) Deliciou’s version. Deliciou does worldwide shipping if you don’t have a local version of this product near you. I haven’t found a gluten free alternative since, unfortunately, so I can’t recommend an easy alternative. I do have a tricky one, though! The Maple-Bourbon Fauxducken (pictured above) from The Vegan Butcher cookbook is a love letter to soy beans and gluten free mock meat alternatives, shaped like a bird. There’s tofu chicken, yuba duck and okara turkey to eat your heart out.
That’s a 100% plant based turkey roast as photographed for Zacchary Bird’s The Vegan Butcher cookbook by Emily Weaving.
@zaccharybird If you’re vego or wanna treat your friends who are, try this for ##sundayroast - recipe on my website! ##veganrecipe ##veganmeat ##plantbased ##vegetarian
♬ original sound - yungtwig
Watch me make the biggest faux turkey ever with Deliciou’s mix.. the jumbo roast turkey so big I can carve it out and fit it on my head to do Monica’s dance from FRIENDS!
Vegan Roast Turkey
Ingredients
- 280g dry plant based chicken mix (see above for where to find)
- 460ml chicken-style or mushroom stock
- 2 tablespoons vegetable oil, plus extra for greasing
- 1 tablespoon maggi seasoning or dark soy sauce
- 1 teaspoon dried sage
- 1 teaspoon onion powder
- 3/4 teaspoon dried rosemary
- 1/2 teaspoon dried marjoram
- 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
- 1/4 teaspoon white pepper
- 1/4 teaspoon liquid smoke
- 60ml (1/4 cup) vegan honey or rice malt syrup
- 2 tablespoons dijon or American mustard
- 1 tablespoon orange juice (from the orange in the stuffing)
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 2 sheets rice paper
- Oil for baking
- 6 tablespoons dairy-free butter (85g/3oz)
- 1 large onion, finely diced
- 1 stalk of celery, finely diced
- 1/4 teaspoon fennel seeds
- 1/4 cup (60ml) beer
- 250g stale bread, blended into breadcrumbs
- 1/2 orange, juiced & zested
- 2 tablespoons chopped sage leaves
- 1/2 tablespoon chopped thyme leaves
- 1/2 teaspoon dry marjoram
- 1 tablespoon vegan Worcestershire sauce
- 1/4 cup (15g) nutritional yeast
- salt + pepper
- 1/3 cup (80ml) chicken-style brot
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 150°C (300°F). Start on the stuffing. Melt 2 tablespoons of the butter in a small frying pan over medium heat. Add the onion and celery and saute for 5 minutes. Add the fennel seeds and beer and cook for 5 minutes or until most of the liquid has evaporated.
- Meanwhile, spread the breadcrumbs over a baking tray and toast for 5 minutes.
- Add the breadcrumbs to the onion and celery mixture, then stir through the orange zest and juice, sage, thyme, marjoram. Worcestershire sauce. nutritional yeast and salt and pepper. Mix in the remaining butter and enough stock for the mixture to come together. Lay out a sheet of plastic wrap and heap the stuffing on top- you may not need all of it. (Extra stuffing can be baked for 30 minutes and served alongside the finished roast.) Enclose the stuffing in the plastic wrap and mould into a log. Place in the freezer while you proceed with the rest of the recipe.
- Increase the oven temperature to 180°C (350°F). To prepare the turkey meat, in a large bowl, combine the chicken mix with all the dry ingredients. Mix through the stock, Maggi seasoning and liquid smoke, allow to sit for 10 minutes, then stir through the oil.
- Divide the turkey meat into thirds. Lay out a sheet of plastic wrap and place two-thirds of the turkey meat on top. Smooth it out until you have an even laver. Unwrap the stuffing log, then place this on top of the turkey meat. Use the plastic wrap to enclose and completely seal the stuffing in the turkey meat.
- Using creative licence, shape the body into as realistic a turkey shape as you please -or a simple log will do. For an unrealistic twist, you can invent a creature from the depths of your imagination.
- Form the remaining turkey meat into two larger drumsticks and two smaller wings, then position them on your roast. Press them in and reshape as needed so the proportions look right.
- Lightly grease a baking tray with oil and place your roast on top. In a small bowl, combine all the turkey glaze ingredients. Use a pastry brush to spread some of the glaze over the roast.
- For the turkey skin, briefly wet each rice paper sheet with water and wipe off the excess. When it's pliable, place it over the roast. Use kitchen scissors to trim the excess and cut the rice paper near the various 'folds' of the turkey so that it evenly covers the roast. Tuck in any loose ends and brush more glaze over the skin.
- Cover the turkey with foil and roast for 1 hour, lovingly reglazing as needed every 20 or so minutes. Remove the foil and roast for a further 30 minutes until the skin begins to crisp up and turn golden brown. Carve it up, serve it up and when people remark 'Jesus Christ!' you can say 'No, it's supposed to be a turkey.'
Notes
Get the look! This roast takes advantage of newer plant-based dry mixes for meat, which layer textured vegetable protein (TVP), starches and methylcellulose together for you to just add water and fat. The versatility of this bast ingredient makes for one of the best ways to control the shape and look of your homemade plant-based meat. Usee reference image or the guide in Bird roast (see page 103 of The Vegan Butcher cookbook) to make this as alarmingly realistic as you please.
Nutrition Facts
Calories
392.12Fat
12.07 gSat. Fat
2.49 gCarbs
60.33 gFiber
5.61 gNet carbs
54.69 gSugar
17.09 gProtein
12.34 gSodium
625.45 mgCholesterol
5.89 mg
