October greetings! I love this spooky month so much. Thanksgiving in Canada is in less than two weeks, so you know I had to come in hot with the sheet pan gravy. For my American friends, consider this early planning :)
This is a mushroom-free, flour/refined starch-free gravy option that’s made almost entirely on a sheet pan. Perfect for spooning over olive oil mashed potatoes and vegan stuffing! We caramelize a bunch of onion, cauliflower, garlic, potato, and herbs, and then we blend that with miso, really good vegetable stock, and a few other seasonings. I also have an amazing vegan mushroom gravy recipe if that’s more your pace.
The preparation is so simple–in line with making a basic pureed vegetable soup. The result is a slightly creamy, thick, super flavourful, umami-rich “gravy” that’s perfect for pouring over basically everything on your holiday plate. Every. Single. Thing. Gravy is in the side dish category at holiday meals and I will fight anyone about this.
I know that cauliflower as a base for gravy seems a bit outside of the box, but when it gets that deep caramelization going and you combine it with all of the other goodness here, it really works! Also, if I’ve learned anything from food trends over the past few years, it’s that cauliflower can be absolutely anything if you put your mind to it. Still here for this neverending vegetable revolution.
If you’re looking for more holiday meal-planning inspiration, I’ve got all of my best ones in this Vegan Holiday Recipes roundup. Hope everyone is having a great week! Stay spooky out there.
Vegan Sheet Pan Gravy
Ingredients
- 1 medium yellow onion, peeled
- 1 small Russet potato, scrubbed
- 4 cups cauliflower florets (from about ½ medium head of cauliflower)
- 4 cloves of garlic, peeled
- 1 tablespoon avocado oil
- 2 teaspoons poultry seasoning
- sea salt and ground black pepper
- 2 tablespoons mellow/light miso
- ⅓ cup raw cashews (soaked for at least 2 hours and drained)
- 2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar
- 3-4 drops liquid smoke
- 3 ½ cups vegetable stock (preferably homemade)
Equipment
Notes
- It’s important to get as much caramelization as you can on the vegetables when they’re roasting. It’s what takes this recipe from soup-esque right on over to bonafide gravy vibes.
- The liquid smoke IS optional, but I’d really recommend seeking it out for this recipe and a bunch of other great things that you can add it to. I can’t make a pot of beans without it now :)
- I used a rich homemade vegetable stock for this and I’d recommend that you do the same. My go-to recipe can be found here.
- If mushroom gravy is your thing, I have a great recipe here.
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 425°F. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.
- Cut the onion into 8 wedges and transfer to the baking sheet. Cut the potato into 1-inch pieces and transfer to the baking sheet as well. Then, add the cauliflower, garlic cloves, avocado oil, poultry seasoning, and lots of salt and pepper to the baking sheet. Toss the vegetables thoroughly to coat in the seasoning. Separating the wedges of onion to expose more edges.
- Slide the vegetables into the oven and roast for 50 minutes (yes, 50 minutes), flipping and stirring them at the halfway point. You want deep caramelization and browning on all the edges.
- Once the vegetables are sufficiently roasted and slightly cooled, transfer them to an upright, high speed blender. To the blender, add the miso, drained cashews, balsamic vinegar, liquid smoke, and vegetable stock. Slowly bring the speed of the blender up to high and blend until your gravy is completely smooth. If you’re finding it to be too thick, add more vegetable stock until you achieve a pourable, but still thick, consistency.
- Check the gravy for seasoning at this point. If it needs more salt, vinegar, pepper, miso, or even more poultry seasoning to suit your taste, adjust accordingly.
- Transfer the sheet pan gravy to a medium saucepan and bring it to a light boil. Serve the hot gravy with mashed potatoes and all of your other favourite holiday foods!
Oh wow, Laura: how brilliant. Clearly this is the season when we switch out our usual stovetop onion or mushroom gravy! I can’t help but ask whether the blender doesn’t make the potato gluey? You know what I mean with processing/blending potatoes … Is it ok here because there’s enough liquid + other stuff? (Also, what herbs would we use to substitute for a ready-made poultry seasoning blend? …sage, thyme …?)
Hi Sherry!
I would say that the potato makes the gravy quite thick, but not gluey. You just have to be careful to not over-blend it. Also, once you add the blended gravy back to the pot, you’ll likely need to add more vegetable stock to thin it out and get it pourable. And poultry seasoning is predominantly sage and thyme with a bit of rosemary and a pinch of nutmeg and white pepper typically.
-L
Thanks for your helpful response, Laura! ––I thought I’d wait to answer until we had tried this, and now I can say for sure, it’s superb. We had a plethora of fresh herbs, so we roasted the veg with whole stems of rosemary and thyme and big bay leaves (discarded after), then added fresh sage and savoury (yes!) to the blender. I’m sure I never would have guessed that traditional poultry seasoning contained nutmeg, so thanks for the tip ––we added a few gratings of that, too. The consistency was terrific, not too thick at all. And happily, we have SO much leftover. I’m suddenly wondering if I need to make biscuits or something …
This is such a unique take on vegan gravy! Hard to believe the lack of mushrooms ;)
Is there a substitute for the cashews? My daughter has a cashew allergy, so I can’t cook with them.
Hi Nicola,
Is it cashews or nuts in general? If it’s just cashews, you could try pine nuts, macadamia nuts or even skinned and sliced almonds. If your daughter has a general nut allergy, I would recommend cutting the vegetable broth back by about 1/4 cup and using a 1/2 cup of unsweetened non-dairy creamer.
-L
O.M.G. I HAVE to try. Have you tried freezing it yet? How does it taste once defrosted. I want to know if I can make this a few days before a dinner party. I hope so! Looks amazing as always!!!
Hi Emily,
I have not tried freezing this recipe. If you only need to make it up a few days out, this recipe would be fine held in the refrigerator in a sealed container. Just reheat it in a saucepan with a few extra splashes of vegetable broth as it will definitely thicken up as it refrigerates. I can’t imagine freezing being problematic since this is essentially a very rich version of a pureed soup recipe. But again, cannot speak to the success of this since I have not done it myself.
-L
Any thoughts on prepping this ahead of time? Up to the puréed stage and then reheating it?
Hi Betsy,
Yes you could definitely do that! This recipe is essentially a very rich pureed soup, so it reheats really well. You will likely need to add additional vegetable stock to get it to the texture you want since the potato will thicken things up a bit.
-L
Laura this sounds incredible!!! Can’t wait to make for Thanksgiving!!
This looks incredible! I’ve been craaaaving comfort food lately with cooler days and cannot wait to make this!
This is so genius! And love the bit about topping cauliflower mash with more cauliflower, sounds amazing to me :)
Umm this is BRILLIANT!!!! Beyond excited to try TG here we come lol!