Over the holiday and fall season, nothing feels more festive and seasonal that a delicious, overflowing, vegan stuffed butternut squash. While traditionally, stuffed squash recipes are filled with ground meat and animal products, this version uses a ground meat alternative to give the stuffing the meaty texture the majority of us undoubtedly crave. And, if you are one of those people that prefers to stay away from fake ‘meats’, this recipe also works fantastically with tofu, tempeh, beans, and lentils!
Trust me, this dish looks incredible once plated and served and is sure to impress friends and family over Thanksgiving and other holiday meals. Even devout meat-eaters will not miss the meat in this delightful, flavor-packed recipe. Plus, this is a more eco-friendly, ethical, and nutritionally balanced alternative to traditional holiday main-dishes such as turkey and ham!
Roasting the Butternut Squash
Roasting the butternut squash is very simple but just takes some time and preparation. You can find my recipe for roasting a butternut squash here. You want to make sure that the flesh of the butternut squash is soft and tender, so that a fork or knife easily slices through it, making it much more pleasant to eat. And, the skin should be crips and soft as well.
Roasting the butternut squash takes about an hour, so I suggest roasting the squash as you are working on the quinoa and veggie stuffing to be as efficient as possible on time. You will be baking the butternut squash with the stuffing in it for an additional 25 minutes so that all the flavors have time to melt together.
Preparing the Quinoa Veggie Stuffing
Oh my goodness this stuffing that goes into the vegan stuffed butternut squash is so, so tasty! It’s packed with vegetables, fiber, vitamins, and minerals, but it’s so bright and full of flavor too. The fake ground ‘meat’ gives this a great texture and the blend of seasoning brings back memories of thanksgiving and holiday feasts from my youth.
To prepare this stuffing, you start by dicing and thinly chopping up your vegetables, including bell pepper, carrots, red onion, zucchini, and celery. Of course, as mentioned in the notes section below the recipe, feel free to replace these vegetables according to personal preference or what you have on hand, but I found that this blend of veggies works particularly well. This recipe also includes added vegetable broth, and spices, plus quinoa to give it an extra kick of nutrition, texture, protein, and flavor.
Towards the end of the cooking time, I added in frozen peas, kale, spinach, and basil that have been cut up into ribbons to add a pop of color and freshness to the dish. For the main source of protein in this dish, I chose to use a fake ground ‘meat’ along with some vegan breakfast patties that I crumbled up. I do know that many people prefer to stick to a whole-foods plant-based diet or dislike meat alternatives, which is why I mentioned earlier that tofu, beans, tempeh, or lentils would make a suitable replacement in this recipe.
Assembling the Vegan Stuffed Butternut Squash
Now, there is some space inside of the butternut squash halves to put the filling inside, but to have the BEST ratio of butternut squash to stuffing, I suggest scooping out the butternut squash from the center of the squash, leaving about an inch of the flesh closest to the outside skin. It doesn’t have to be pretty or perfect the way you remove the butternut squash (as you can see, the way I did it wasn’t particularly beautiful), because once you load up the squash halves with the filling, nobody will be able to see the imperfections!
Also do not worry because that delicious butternut squash you removed from the center does not have to go to waste! I chose to cut mine into small cubes and mix it into the quinoa and veggie stuffing, but this would also make a great addition to a salad, rice/nourish bowl, burrito, you name it!
Once the center of the butternut squash is hollowed out, you can generously fill it with the quinoa stuffing. As I mention in the recipe, the stuffing should form a little mountain over the top of the butternut squash halves. I ended up having some leftover stuffing that didn’t fit into the squashes, and I saved this to serve it as a side dish with the vegan stuffed butternut squash.
Once stuffed, you bake everything together, allowing the flavors to meld and the top of the stuffing mountains (that’s what I call them) to grow crisp. Serve the vegan stuffed butternut squash with a side of cranberry sauce, roasted brussels sprouts (find my recipe here!), and maybe some of that leftover quinoa stuffing! I have yet to try making a vegan gravy, but for those of you who enjoy a more traditional holiday feast, you can try out this recipe from Ela Vegan.
So, without further ado, here’s the recipe!
Quinoa and Vegetable Stuffed Butternut Squash
Ingredients
- 4 stalks celery with the leaves
- 1 zucchini
- 4 carrots or 3 large handfuls baby carrots
- 1 bell pepper
- ½ red onion
- 3 cloves garlic
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 2 ½ cups vegetable stock divided
- 2 sprigs rosemary, chopped finely, or 1 tsp dried rosemary
- ½ tsp coriander
- 1' tsp cumin
- ½ tsp chili powder
- ½ tsp salt
- ¼ cup quinoa
- 1 cup vegan ground 'meat'
- 1 bunch kale
- ½ cup frozen peas
- 1 handful spinach (opt.)
- 1 handful basil (opt.)
- 1 roasted and halved butternut squash
Instructions
- To start, preheat your oven to 350°F. First, prep all of the vegetables by chopping the carrots, celery, celery leaves, zucchini, red onion, bell pepper into small pieces and mincing the garlic. Also, remove the stems from the bunch of kale and any thick stems of the spinachSet these all aside (I placed them all in one bowl to keep things organized), and heat up the tablespoon of olive oil on a large saucepan over medium heat.
- Add in all of the vegetables to the saucepan after allowing the olive oil to heat up for about a minute. Sauté the vegetables for 3-5 minutes whilst stirring once every 30 seconds, or until the onion and celery have started to become translucent. The vegetables should have started to release moisture as well. Turn up the heat to medium-high and add in 1 ½ cup of the vegetable stock to the saucepan along with the rosemary, cumin, coriander, and chili powder, stirring so that all the ingredients get combined and that the vegetables are cooking evenly.
- Once the vegetable broth has reached a slow boil, add in the 1/4 of quinoa and vegan ground 'meat', and stir to combine. Lower the heat to a medium-low simmer, and leave the mixture partially covered. Cook for 2 minutes shorter than the recommended cooking time of the quinoa (I cooked mine for 10 minutes and the recommended cooking time was between 10 and 15 minutes), pausing to stir once every couple of minutes.
- Meanwhile, slice the kale leaves that have been removed from the stem into thin ribbons. Roughly chop up the spinach and basil if using as well. Once the quinoa has finished cooking, add in the last ½ cup of vegetable broth as well as the ½ cup of frozen peas, and turn up the heat to bring the mixture to a boil again. Cook everything on medium-high, uncovered, for several minutes, making sure to stir every couple seconds for another 5 minutes. The stuffing mix should be moist but not have too much liquid in it. Then, add in the kale, spinach and basil, and stir this in, cooking everything together for another 3-5 minutes. Once the stuffing is done and the greens are bright green and wilted, turn off the heat, and set the saucepan aside.
- With a spoon, remove the middle part of the halved roasted butternut squash, leaving about an inch of the flesh closest to the outside of the squash. On a cutting board, chop up the removed butternut squash into small ½ inch cubes, and add it into the stuffing mixture, mixing it to combine. Using a spoon, scoop the quinoa and vegetable stuffing into the hollowed out centers of the butternut squash halves. There should be enough stuffing in each of the squash halves to create a little mountain, but there will likely be extra stuffing that you can serve as a side-dish.
- Bake the stuffed squashes in the preheated oven for 22-25 minutes, or until the stuffing on top of the squash looks nice and crisp. Remove from the heat and enjoy warm with a side of cranberry sauce and maybe some of that extra quinoa stuffing mix!
Notes
- The reason I use the celery leaves in this recipe is that they are full of flavor, kind of like parsley, and would otherwise become food waste. They add a very nice flavor to this dish and can be handled like any other fresh herb.
- Feel free to customize this recipe according to the ingredients you have on hand. If you have any other vegetables that you need to use up, or simply don’t have some of the vegetables, you can totally add in other veggies like tomatoes, cucumbers, collard greens, and potatoes.
- For the vegan ground ‘meat’: I used about half of a container of Trader Joe’s meatless ground beef and one and a half of Trader Joe’s vegan breakfast patties, crumbled up. If you dislike fake ‘meats’ or would rather use something else, you could try this recipe using tofu, beans, or lentils as a source of protein. If you do end up using dried lentils, you would need to cook it longer or cook the lentils separately and mix it into the stuffing when you add in the kale and greens.
Curious for more?
If you enjoyed this recipe or are looking for more plant-based/vegan recipes, check out some of my other recipes here. These include lentil veggie patties, vegan moussaka, tofu rice bowls, pancakes, and more!
Or, if you want to read up on the environmental benefits of swapping to a more plant-based diet, check out this post and take a look at my environmental post category.
And, make sure to follow my new youtube account, Eco Food Stuff! I’m planning on creating videos for the majority of my future recipes and would love to hear from all of you what you think. 🙂
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