It’s always been a tradition to plan your dish around the protein you want and then let it dictate the other ingredients. But what if you let vegetables be the star of the show? You might be surprised that it’s easy to create a tasty and satisfying dish with one or two vegetables without adding meat. Here are some ideas to get you inspired.
Choose Vegetables Suited For Main Dishes
When building a vegetable-focused dish, choose vegetables with flavours suitable for main dishes. Keep lighter and softer vegetables like leafy greens and cherry tomatoes as side dishes. The go-to choice is root vegetables like celery and carrots, which are delicious and filling. For instance, try roasted root vegetables with hazelnuts and brown butter recipes.
The best way to enjoy root vegetables is to caramelise them, which brings out the intense sweet and nutty flavours. The addition of butter and hazelnut dials up the taste of roasted carrots, sweet potatoes, celery roots and parsnips.
Make Salads that Fill You Up
Whether you want something to prepare for a quick lunch or pair it with a main dish, vegetable salads always make delicious sides. Vegetables are great in salads because of their varied textures and colours. If you want your vegetable salad to be a meal on its own, it must be filling and delicious.
You can add all your favourite veggies, from cucumbers, radishes, romaine lettuce leaves, and tomatoes to fresh herbs. Add body to the salad with pantry staples or filling ingredients, like chickpeas and black beans or nuts, herbs, and roasted root vegetables.
Quick and Flavourful Veggie Noodles
If you find yourself staring at a bunch of vegetables and wondering what dish to cook, try vegetable stir-fry noodles. You can stir-fry cooked vegan noodles with lots of vegetables, then season them with a splash of vinegar, sauces and black pepper to improve the taste.
You don’t need a complicated ingredient list since you can use any noodle and vegetable, such as carrots, cabbage, green beans, and bell peppers. Alternatively, make vegetable noodles from scratch, using a spiraliser from sweet potatoes, butternut squash, parsnips, carrots or zucchini. Try cooking tenderstem broccoli, then repurpose the stems into noodles by spiralising and garnishing them with a little sesame oil.
Make Delicious Vegetable Burgers
Instead of a savoury meat-based patty, use vegetables and grains to make vegetable burgers. Patties can feature a combination of broccoli, carrots, spinach, and mushrooms. Using tasty and nutritious vegetables to make your burger patties elevates the taste of veggie burgers.
Since veggie and bean burgers don’t hold together like meat burgers, you can use breadcrumbs and eggs to hold the patty together. Add texture to your burgers with walnuts or sunflower seeds. When your veggie patties are ready, put together your burger with fresh tomatoes, leafy greens and some cheese.
Grilled Vegetable Skewers
Did you know you can make vegetable skewers and pair them with potato salad, slaw and pasta salad? While grilled skewers are not the main dishes, the unique texture and flavour will make them the star of your BBQ. You need red onions, squash, zucchini, red bell peppers and tomatoes, and you can even add mushrooms or fruits like pineapple. Before you grill the skewers, brush some balsamic vinaigrette on the ingredients. The vegetables will have a little browning when you take them off the grill.
You can never go wrong with vegetable main dishes. Most veggies are versatile, and you can transform them into any dish, from burgers to pizza. Be creative and try out vegetarian versions of your favourite dishes, and you will be surprised by the results.