Pour a Jug of Homemade Vegan Gravy

Broke Bank Vegan

Everyone likes a nice jug of gravy on their vegan mashed potatoes, roast spuds or veggie roast dinner. But conventional gravy is of course made with meat juice, and most store-bought brands are made with either factory-farmed meats or palm oil or both. Also read our post on homemade vegan broth and stock.

Read up on food safety for people and pets (many foods including mushrooms, onion, garlic and spices are unsafe near animal friends). It’s best to just bin allium scraps (onion, garlic, leeks, shallots, chives) as like tomato/citrus/rhubarb scraps, acids could harm compost creatures.

For tinned ingredients, pop lids inside cans (or pop ring-pulls back over holes) to avoid wildlife getting trapped).

The secret of good gravy is ‘umami’ (using cheesy-tasting nutritional yeast or miso (not for pregnancy/nursing or weak immune systems, as it’s unpasteurised). Soy sauce (or tamari) is also often used, to dark the colour and enrich the flavour. Recycle packaging at supermarket bag bins, if your kerbside does not recycle.

Make Your Own No-Recipe Gravy

Madeleine Olivia

If you want to have a got at making an ‘eyeball’ gravy (measuring ingredients as you see fit), this gravy is ready in under 30 minutes.

Dice some onion and mince some garlic, then warm your veggie stock. Heat up some vegan butter (Flora has no palm oil) in a pan on medium heat, then add your onion with a pinch of salt. Cook for around 10 minutes, then add the garlic and cook for another minute, don’t let it brown or it will become bitter.

Then sprinkle in enough flour to make a paste, cook until the ‘raw flour taste’ has gone. Don’t overcook and add a little oil, if the mix gets too dry. Then build your flavour with tomato puree, nutritional yeast, and optional herbs.

Then slowly start whisking in your warm stock, until it thickens. Repeat until all the stock is used up, season to taste and simmer for 10 minutes until thick and glossy. It will thicken as it cools. If you have used a bay leaf, remember to remove it before serving!

If your gravy is lumpy, you are adding the stock too quickly. In a pinch, use a hand blender to smooth your gravy, then try slower next time!

Make Your Own Vegetable Stock (no palm oil)

This veggie stock recipe (Simple Vegan Blog) is a good one to master, as it forms the base for many stews and meals, and usually is the base for good vegan gravy.

You only need 9 ingredients, and this is a great recipe to use up scraps, so it’s a zero-waste affordable recipe too. In a sealed container, leftovers will keep for a few days in the fridge. You can also freeze it in batches, just be sure to cool first, place in a sealed silicone container and thaw in the fridge a day or two before use.

The base ingredients are just: