Easy Vegan TV Dinner ~ Beyond Salisbury Steak & Gravy

Remember those TV dinners from back in the day? They came with fake mashed potatoes, frozen veggies and they were overall pretty terrible. And I loved them. Okay, maybe in my memory I loved them and that’s where today’s recipe comes from, but I do have fond memories that I guess involve eating a frozen aluminum tray of mediocre-ness.

Anyway, those skewed memories are what brought us here today.

In my memory, my favorite TV dinner was the one with Salisbury steak, mashed potatoes and green beans. Why? Mostly because the gravy was so plentiful that you could spread it on everything else and give it a little more flavor than just the salt and black pepper required.

This vegan TV dinner recipe doesn’t have green beans because unless they are frozen or canned, it’s been pretty hard to find fresh green beans except for a few weeks in the Spring. So we have a vegetable that I only learned to love as an adult, Brussels sprouts.

The best part about turning a TV dinner into a grownup vegan meal is that you can create little hacks to make the process go by quickly.

The ingredient list for this meal is super easy and you can totally eliminate the mushrooms if you want to cut down on the cook time even more. I happen to LOVE mushrooms and I was in that moment in time where I needed to use the shrooms or lose them.

I ain’t losing no mushrooms. #Notsorry

The first step is to wash and rinse the vegetables, including the mushrooms if you choose to keep them. Chop the potatoes and Brussels sprouts and put them on a baking sheet. See? I told ya this was going to be easy. Bake the vegetables at 180/200C for 35 minutes or until they’re nice and done. Keep baking if the potatoes or sprouts are too hard or can’t be punctured with a fork.

While the vegetables bake, get started on the mushrooms. I like to cook them in a naked pan to get them started and let them sweat out some of that water. You can even cover the skillet and move the process along if you’re pressed for time. Once it seems as if all the water is out, feel free to add some oil or waste-free broth to keep all that delicious brown goodness from sticking to the pan.

When the mushrooms look good or close to it, add the onions. I did a rough chop for this recipe to keep everything fairly uniform in size, but cut them however your pretty little heart desires.

The mushrooms and onions will be the base of your gravy, but first I recommend adding the Beyond Burgers (check out a few of my Beyond recipes here) to the skillet. Let them cook off some of that fat so you can use it for the gravy instead of adding extra fat to this vegan recipe. Remove the burgers from pan and put them off to the side or in the oven to keep them warm.

I used cornstarch (I forgot to add it to the ingredients list and now I have to go back to update my Cronometer!) instead of flour so if you prefer a flour-based gravy you will need to switch around the order.

So, add more water or broth, mustard and balsamic vinegar and stir until it starts to bubble and everything is blended, especially the mustard. When it’s starting to reduce, add a few grams of cornstarch, then let the liquid boil before you simmer it until thick. Once thick, add the Beyond patties to the gravy and cover. Simmer a few minutes, until cooked through, and serve.

Pour the gravy over everything if you want, but if you season your veggies probably you won’t need it, but it will just be a nice addition to an easy weeknight vegan dinner.

And there you have it, vegan Salisbury steak dinner made for your grownup, cruelty free palate.

Enjoy!