I am very, very excited for the changing season. Not because I love the cold (I don’t – brr!) but because I love the FOOD.
This post kicks off a returning series on Healthy Tipping Point – Vegetarian Thanksgiving. And for the initial post, I’m doing a fun ‘giveaway’; see the end of the post!
Every year, right before November, I try out a bunch of yummy recipes in preparation of one of my most beloved holidays. Even before I went veg, my absolute favorite part of Thanksgiving has always been the delicious side dishes… Who has room for turkey when there’s mashed potatoes, sweet potato casserole, green bean casserole, stuffing, cranberries, and PIE (lots and lots of pie) to be eaten?! Not me.
Bring on the mashed potatoes.
There are three secrets to great mashed potatoes:
1) The type of potato
2) The seasonings
3) Not overcooking the potatoes
This recipe relies on ‘shrooms, carrots, and chives for the flavor. And for the potato? My favorite type is, without a doubt, Yukon Gold.
Shroomy Mashed Potatoes
Ingredients (for 5 servings):
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7 yukon gold potatoes
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8 cremini mushrooms
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1 small carrot
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3 tablespoon chives (separated in 2 and 1 tablespoons)
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1 tablespoon plus 1/4 cup Earth Balance (or butter)
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1/4 cup rice milk (or milk)
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1 teaspoon kosher salt
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Several pinches of pepper
Directions:
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Bring large, covered pot of water to boil (enough to completely cover the potatoes).
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Peel 4 of the 7 potatoes – I like to leave some skin on for texture and taste – and slice all 7 potatoes equally.
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Add potatoes to boiling water and cook for 20 minutes. No more!
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Meanwhile, thinly slice mushrooms and grate carrots. In a small wok, cook mushrooms, carrots, and Earth Balance until mushrooms brown.
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Drain potatoes.
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In a mixing bowl with a masher (or a Kitchen Aid stand mixer), combine potatoes, mushrooms, carrots, 2 tablespoons chives, milk, Earth Balance, salt, and pepper until all the potato lumps are gone.
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Serve and top with remaining chives.
These potatoes won’t last long. Both the Husband and I are currently eyeing the fridge and considering another buttery serving.
What’s your favorite Thanksgiving side dish? Any great recipes you can link to? I’ll randomly select one commenter and donate $20 in their name to Feeding America. So please – wax poetic about mashed potatoes!
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{ 74 comments… read them below or add one }
Garlic mashed potatoes are ah-mazing!! These look fun too, I’d never think to put mushrooms in mashed potatoes!
MMMM those look delish! Mac and cheese is prob my favorite even though its a newer dish for turkey day for us.
These sound delicious! I too am excited about fall/winter cooking, and even though we’ve already had Canadian Thanksgiving, I’ll gladly celebrate the US one too! Here are some of my faves:
-Fall vegetable chili http://wp.me/pSUCS-2EN
-Baked spaghetti squash with herbs and garlic http://wp.me/pSUCS-2CD
- Red hubbard squash and apple soup http://wp.me/pSUCS-2CG
- Butternut squash, carrot and ginger soup http://wp.me/pSUCS-1Ll
- Pumpkin pie spiced popcorn mix http://wp.me/pSUCS-2Io (I’m actually eating some right now!!)
My favorite side dish is my husband’s grandmother’s cream corn casserole. Yummy
A carb-lovers dream! (that would be ME!).
~
I used to hate mashed potatoes, but something happened and now I love them!! My favorite are the ones they serve at Bonefish Grill—seriously the best!
I love roasted garlic mashed potatoes the best! I’m not even a potato person, but love these a lot! We made them for our one year anniversary back in August and have been waiting for Thanksgiving to make them agian!
Those muchroomy potatoes sound/look sooo delicious!
My fav thanksgiving dish is stuffing, by far. My mom makes yummy stuff with lots of celery and spices. It’s amazing.
Those potatoes look so good! I love mixing things into my mashed potatoes. When I was pregnant my #1 craving was mashed potatoes with collards mixed in. It was amazing!
Uh, I accidentally bolded everything instead of just the word so. Fail
My favorite is mashed SWEET potatoes. I don’t actually love regular mashed potatoes….but the sweet potatoes make a delicious side dish! We also have a cranberry salad that is to-die-for!!
Yours does look tasty, though!
i agree with you! turkey-ehhhh not so much but the sides are the best
love the addition of the mushrooms….mmmmmmm
My favorite is cranberry sauce! I follow Angela’s recipe on Oh She Glows!
My family always has tamales as a side dish, its not Thanksgiving without them! We get them here: http://delicioustamales.com/
Those mashed potatoes look so, so good. I think they might be my favorite side dish, but unfortunately my family never had them at Thanksgiving growing up (my grandmother did the cooking, otherwise I would have made them!).
I love all the side dishes! Pumpkin bread, squash, corn, mashed potatoes, everything but green bean casserole (I like green beans, but I can’t stomach creamy casserole dishes). I think I’m going to make a different sort of sweet potato casserole this year; I’m not a fan of the super sugary casserole with marshmallows, so I’ve been tinkering with a sweet potato dish infused with apple cider, slice pears, and almonds.
I love mashed SWEET potatoes (though I love mashed white potatoes too). My mom makes them with lots of butter and brown sugar, and they’re delicious, like a dessert.
love corn cassrole with mashed potatoes mixed in…yummy, plus homemade warm rolls with butter
my all-time favorite thanksgiving recipe is martha stewart’s mashed sweet potatoes. delectably simple and mouthwateringly fantastic. i tend to eat them for breakfast, lunch and dinner the days following t-giving. enjoy!
http://www.marthastewart.com/344009/mashed-sweet-potatoes
I love mashed potato and I love vegetarian stuffing! When it comes to thanksgiving, I am ALL about the CARBS!!!
How to choose? I love my mom’s sweet potatoes. No mashing or marshmallows in this house! She peels them and chunks them into big bites. Boils them for a little bit, and then they are poured into a ginormous roaster pan. Large quantities of butter and brown sugar work carmelization magic. I beg for leftovers!
http://healthylifehappycook.com/2011/recipes/salad-recipes/balsamic-quinoa-roasted-tomatoes-carmelized-shallots/
I made this basamic quinoa last week, and it tasted like Thanksgiving stuffing to me without the bread, and lots of protein.
http://ohsheglows.com/2011/02/10/lovely-light-cranberry-apple-and-almond-quinoa/
This salad was marvelous hot or cold. I even put it into a wrap for a leftover lunch.
I love anything quinoa right now. I think I’ll be making something like this to attempt to expand my extended families palates.
My favorite side dish is most definitely Tee’s Corn Pudding (google it – I think it originally came from a Southern Living cookbook). It’s seriously the best thing on the planet…almost like a dessert.
Favorite t-giving side??? That’s hard. I honestly love sweet potato casserole with all the brown sugar & pecans on top. It is sickenly sweet, but it is, for me, the quintessential autumnal dish!
I couldn’t agree more that the side dishes (more specifically, the POTATO side dishes) are what I love the most about Thanksgiving. I could honestly easily go without the turkey, but I always take a little for the extra protein and just because I guess I feel like I’m “supposed to” since it’s Thanksgiving.
My favorite side dish is definitely sweet potato casserole/pie!! Famous Dave’s has a cookbook that has the most amazing recipe for it. It’s my favorite dish every Thanksgiving!
Without a doubt, sweet potato casserole is my absolute favorite!! (with the brown sugar and pecan topping, not marshmallows)
Mashed potatoes are by FAR my favorite at Thanksgiving. As the only vegetarian in my family, there’s not a lot that I “can” eat (most of the dishes are cooked with chicken/turkey stock)so I am always sure to load up on the taters. I probably eat the equivalent of 4 russets on T-giving day. Glorious.
Stuffing is hands down my favorite dish at Thanksgiving. I would eat an entire plate of it and nothing else if it were appropriate.
Oooh, tough call between sweet potato casserole & cranberry sauce. Both are family recipes (and therefore cannot be shared
I love to talk food. My fave side is the mashed sweet potatoes, with stuffing, and that canned cranberry stuff cut into slices. hehe. I like to mix my food. I’m all about mixing it all together on your fork and tasting it all at once. I love Thanksgiving! mmmmmm
Oh my gosh! I am a mashed potato girl. I looove them, and everyone used to just sit back and watch me go for second and third helpings, laughing that this little girl could shovel so much in. I’m not so little anymore, but I still tend to shovel them in at Thanksgiving. I can’t help it. I love them. I’m pretty boring, though. Just plain mashed potatoes whipped up with milk or half and half or cream, and then a nice dollop of butter on top with s&p. Add some gravy and we’re good to go. Seriously yummy.
This is so thoughtful of you!
My favorite Thanksgiving side dish is my mom’s stuffing. I’ve been a vegetarian since I was about 9, and my mom always makes me a separate stuffing that she cooks outside of the turkey. She adds onions, celery, walnuts, fresh cranberries, and lots of herbs and seasonings. It is so delicious, and also so kind of her to honor my eating habits at such a young age.
Oh gosh sooo yummy looking! This will be my first vegetarian thanksgiving so lets hope my family and myself will be able to accommodate haha.
I love Angela’s high protein garlic mashed potatoes – http://ohsheglows.com/2010/09/08/high-protein-garlic-mashed-potatoes/
I made them last year and no one even knew they had beans in them!
My favorite side is probably stuffing – although I have yet to find a vegetarian one that is as good as my mom’s that is cooked inside the turkey with sausage. (I know I know, it’s bad to cook it inside for safety reasons, but she always did it and I turned out fine – and it and the turkey always tasted great).
Yummy, those potatoes look good! I think my favorite side dish at Thanksgiving is my veggie casserole,it is so good!!!
I love my grandma’s sour cream and cheddar mashed potatoes. She made them every year for Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter. I took over the tradition for her a few years before she passed away. I even made them for Thanksgiving when I lived in Spain, with a few alterations (creme fraiche instead of sour cream, different potatoes). My friend who lived on a US military base there even gifted me some cheddar from the PX so I could make them taste like home.
This recipe looks SO good: http://www.skinnytaste.com/2011/10/mashed-sweet-potatoes-brulee.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+weightwatcherspointsrecipes+%28Gina%27s+Skinny+Recipes%29
My sister makes this stuffing recipe for thanksgiving: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/dave-lieberman/sourdough-bread-stuffing-recipe/index.html
it is AMAZING. instead of butter, she uses a bit of olive oil.
I also love the sides! Here are 2 of my faves.
Warm Brussels Sprouts Salad:
http://www.leadingthegoodlife.net/2010/11/28/warm-brussels-sprout-salad/
Creamy Roasted Poblano Polenta:
http://www.leadingthegoodlife.net/2010/10/05/creamy-roasted-poblano-polenta/
It used to be that lovely canned cranberry sauce that came out in a perfect cylinder… these days I’m a big potatoes au gratin fan mmmmmm, cheesey goodness.
My favorite side is my mom’s vegetarian stuffing! She makes a regular stuffing (most have chicken fat as an ingredient on the box, if it’s boxed lol) and she makes a homemade one that’s vegetarian just for lil ole me. I love it! That and her green bean salad. I’ve tried a million times to make it and she’s obviously left something out of the ingredients when she told me how to do it.
I’m all about the side dishes as a vegetarian on Thanksgiving, but since my sister hates mashed potatoes (I know, she’s crazy) I made a really good pizza for us to have last year in lieu of Turkey- http://whatkateiscooking.com/?p=43. Even the turkey eaters wanted a slice!
Since I don’t eat the turkey, I have plenty of room on my plate for my aunt’s famous sweet potato casserole. Made with the maple syrup they make each year!
how very tasty indeed!!!
Green bean casserole! My G-ma’s can’t be beat
My husband and I are buying our first real house together and want to have Thanksgiving next year. Thanks for a great recipe for that!
My favorite side dish is the stuffing. I LOVE the crunch next to the softness of it. Ours is simple ground turkey meat, onions, celery, veggie/chicken stock and mix it all together with some spices and YUM. I will have to try your mashed potato recipe.
My nanny’s super simple sweet potato/pineapple/marshmallow casserole is my all time favorite. Probably mostly because it reminds me of her & holidays growing up, but also bc it’s super easy & yummy
http://cookinfanatic.com/2010/11/food-memories/
My favorites are all the side dishes, of course! I love homemade cranberry sauce and mashed potatoes…oh my, I’m so excited for Thanksgiving already
Pumpkin Pull Apart Monkey Bread! http://www.laurenslatest.com/pumpkin-pull-apart-monkey-bread-with-maple-glaze/
And Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls! http://www.laurenslatest.com/pumpkin-maple-rolls/
those look so delicious! I love fancy mashed potatoes; so much better than regular ones!
Yummy!! I love mashed red potatoes (skin on!!) with lots of garlic and chives
When I was younger, I HATED thanksgiving. I didn’t like any of the dishes! Hated turkey, green bean casserole, pie (yes, pie), everything!…except one thing. The stuffing. It’s delicious. I now like most thanksgiving dishes (except potatoes, sorry :S) but stuffing remains to be my favorite!!
Yummm, those look so good. I love shrooms (eating some right now!) My favorite Thanksgiving dish is Grandma’s Apple Pie… her recipe is the best! I only make it for very lucky people
I think lumpy mashed potatoes are my favorite Thanksgiving dish — but I love it all! I couldn’t find my recipe online (I think it’s Southern Living) but it has unpeeled potatoes mashed w/ sour cream or plain yogurt, sliced green onions, and I add cloves of garlic to the boiling water. They’re good cold or hot, eaten with a spoon, fork or finger. Good by the bite, plate or bowl. Especially good for mixing with other food (my fav is kale)! Can you tell I love me some mashed potatoes?
My favorite Thanksgiving side dish is my dad’s Marshmallow Sweet Potato Casserole!
I think my fav side dish is plain old green bean casserole with the recipe from the side of the fried onions. I know it isn’t exciting but I love it. I didn’t like it until about two years ago though, couldn’t get over the cream of mushroom in the mix but I guess your tastes do change as you get older. I love sweet potatoes too with butter, brown sugar and cinnamon, no marshmallows required!
This sounds so yummy! I will definitely try to make it! As for Thanksgiving side dishes, I love stuffing and green beans!
My new favorite side dish is this apple cranberry relish my sister makes. My family has always been a “pop the lid of the jelly” kind of people. I didn’t even know cranberry sauce could come in any form besides a jelly. My older sister made it a couple of years ago and it was a hit. I will definitely be getting the recipe since I am cooking dinner this year!
Roasted veggies are my favorite! Least favorite? Stuffing. I do not understand why everyone loves it so much.
Oh, mashed potatoes, how I love thee! However, you are no longer my favourite Thanksgiving side dish…this recipe is: http://crockpot365.blogspot.com/2008/11/perfect-homemade-stuffing-crockpot.html Delicious stuffing made in the slow cooker (because I have an aversion to putting anything inside a raw bird). I’ve made this every Thanksgiving & Christmas since I found the recipe and I could seriously just eat bowls of it and be totally satisfied. Love, love, love!
This recipe looks great! It’s too bad Canadian Thanksgiving is already over.
My favourite Thanksgiving side dish is my aunt’s spaghetti squash casserole. I have no idea where she got the recipe, but it is amazing!
My grandmother’s biscuits!! So so good!
thanksgiving is my favorite too! one year we had trifecta mashed potatoes, with 3 different kinds of potato. so good!
this sounds pretty boring but i swear its delicious! just slice sweet potatoes into rounds, sprinkle them in some chili powder and salt and bake them at 450 degrees convection for like half an hour…sooo good! i even put ketchup on the side
Mashed potatoes, actually mashed SWEET potatoes are the BEST.
My favorite Thanksgiving side dish is cornbread dressing (made vegetarian by using vegetable broth instead of chicken/turkey)! I think dressing is so special because it’s only made around the holidays.
Mashed potatoes were my favorite when I was little – used to get a whole plate of them from buffets! Now I lean more towards stuffing – us vegetarians usually make a separate dish for ourselves.
Those mashed potatoes look good. I wish my family liked mushrooms!
I love cranberries. When I was growing up, we always ate canned cranberry sauce, but now I make a homemade version. This recipe is really easy (but I cut down on the sugar in it, since I like it tart): http://preview.tinyurl.com/3f3myzy
Love the idea of adding mushrooms!
my favorite Thanksgiving vegetarian recipe is black bean stuffing! One can of re-fried black beans, 1 1/2 cups of plain coconut milk, 1/2 onion, 2 stalks celery, 1 chopped carrot, 1 tbsp garlic, 8 slices toasted whole wheat bread, 2 tbsp coconut oil, 1 small box raisins, 1/4 cup parsley. winner every time!
Those potates look delicious! I always crave mashed potatoes and never make them. I need to change that and I think this recipe will do it! Thanks!
Thanksgiving was always my least favorite holiday because it was all about food, and it was all about food I don’t like! Cranberries, stuffing, turkey, sweet potatoes, ewwwwww. I remember wishing and praying we could just have pizza one year, lol.
Now I can make my own food and have some sort of quinoa salad or even be really crazy and make enchiladas. Ha! That’s something to be thankful for: making my own food
Does apple cider count?
I used yogurt instead of milk. OMG so good. These are such a great idea.