If the word Thanksgiving gets brought up in a conversation, and your mind doesn’t immediately go to turkey or pumpkin pie, then I don’t know what’s wrong with you. I am a festive, turkey-eating, Thanksgiving lover. Even more than turkey on the Thanksgiving table with gravy or cranberry sauce, I love an excess amount of leftover turkey sandwiches for weeks to come.
So when my family informed me we would be having dinner at my aunt’s home who recently became vegan to the point where they won’t allow meat into their home, I had to come to terms with the hard fact that my Thanksgiving was going to be turkey-less this year. We prepared like any amateur vegans and began researching vegan recipes and figuring out how to make classic Thanksgiving recipes without the butter and cream and well, meat. The operation deemed successful in some cases of the sweet potatoes and roasted vegetables of course. Then unsuccessful in others, like when my mother attempted to make whipped cream out of the juice from a can of garbanzo beans.
Since my aunt is a pro at this vegan thing, our pies were specially ordered form a local Salt Lake City vegan bakery, instead of turkey juice she made gravy out of mushrooms and you couldn’t even notice the lack of cream and butter of the mashed potatoes. Our table provided a Thanksgiving feast of everything but the turkey. In the end, the meal was great, the company was lovely and Thanksgiving was still Thanksgiving without the turkey and the leftover turkey sandwiches.
I have provided the recipe to my favorite recipe for wild rice, sweet potatoes, and toasted chickpeas just in case you feel like being brave this next holiday and giving the vegan life a try.
2 very large sweet potatoes
2 cans of chickpeas
1 cup of wild rice blend
Olive oil
Salt & pepper
Cut up sweet potatoes and lay them out on a baking sheet with lots of olive oil, salt, and pepper. These will take at least 45 minutes to cook so make sure to do them first. For rice, I used a blend of wild rice and brown rice but you can use whatever kind you like. Open the cans of chickpeas and drain out the liquid. Lay the chickpeas out on a baking sheet and once again coat heavily with olive oil, salt, and pepper. Bake them in the oven for 10-15 minutes or until lightly toasted. Combine cooked rice, sweet potatoes, and toasted chickpeas in a casserole dish and gently mix.