Coming home for vegan Christmas

I can’t remember the last time we spent Christmas in the UK. It must have been at least ten years ago. In the past, our festive celebrations have been fairly low key events, just a special meal and a relaxing day at home, although we’ve never mastered the French tradition of eating ‘Christmas dinner’ – Réveillon – on the 24^th. The French traditional meal starts late and goes on well past midnight. Nevertheless, they’ve still usually got enough energy to get up and go out on the Chasse on Christmas Day. Our first year in France (way before we became vegan) I cooked a French-style meal, I think following a recipe in the Intermarche Christmas catalogue! Subsequent years I picked a European country and we had a themed meal, following its traditions, veganised, of course. So, we’ve had Swedish no-meat balls and Janssons temptation, washed down with snapps, and Polish pierogi and latkes followed by stewed fruit and vegan cream, with vodka, of course.

This year we find ourselves in the UK (more of this in next week’s post), so what better than to explore everything that is on offer in the supermarkets to make a perfect vegan Christmas. We will be six for Christmas day; three vegans, one vegan tolerant, and two older folk who have no idea what our ‘funny food’ is all about. It will be an interesting mix. My plan, ably assisted by Mr VV’s vegan daughter (VDD), is for us to have a traditional English Christmas dinner, minus the cruelty. I suspect that, rather like the last time I cooked Christmas for a mixed audience over twenty years ago, no one will notice. Back then, there wasn’t the plethora of vegetarian options available and the ubiquitous nut roast was the veggie centrepiece. I remember mine, made to a Vegetarian Cookery School recipe, being demolished by the non-veggies in an instant.

First things first, we needed to go shopping. It can come of a bit of shock to the system when you are used to the dismal offerings of Intermarche, buoyed by the occasional fifty-kilometre round trip for a foray to Leclerc, Carrefour or Grand Frais. Sainsburys is only four miles away, is open until 10pm every night and delivers. Each time I visit I’m like a kid in a candy shop; the chill cabinets of vegan food seem to grow longer every time and all the vegan food is clearly marked. (Not quite as well as Jumbo and Albert Heijn in the Netherlands, but coming close.) In fact, the only thing I could not find was vegan-friendly toothpaste, but turn to Superdrug or Tesco and there are vegan-friendly personal care ranges, at prices much lower than the Bio shop offerings and avoiding the delivery costs of shopping online.

But, back to the question of Christmas food shopping. Sunday, in a two-and-a-half hour whirlwind, we hit four supermarkets, and still had time for a soya latte and a vegan rocky road in Costa. Many expats complain about the hectic UK lifestyle and the fact that shops are open all hours, but I love the convenience, and the feeling you get of being alive. In less time than it takes to drive to Leclerc and back we’d done a supermarket sweep and tracked down everything we needed for a vegan Christmas.

 

For ‘starters’ we decided to go with a party theme and loaded us up with plenty of nibbles which we can simply pop into the oven or microwave. It’s always difficult when you are cooking in a strange kitchen. The main course of a Christmas dinner is actually quite easy to veganise. The basics: roast potatoes, mashed potatoes, Brussel sprouts (with vegan ‘bacon’ bits), glazed carrots, peas, braised red cabbage, sage and onion stuffing and gravy are all vegan. Yes, Bisto is vegan! Traditional ‘pigs in blankets’ were replaced with ‘pigs in duvets’ (M&S). We were too late to track down a large vegan festive roast, but spotted some individual vegan roasts in the Co-op, another store that surprised me with its range of vegan offerings. 

Tracking down a Christmas pudding was a little trickier, as by Sunday afternoon the supermarkets had either sold out or the puddings available were not vegan. However, we came up trumps in Asda with a vegan, gluten free pud that will be great with vegan Elmlea or some traditional Birds custard made with oat milk. Asda also scored for the tastiest and cheapest vegan mince pies. Rounding off the shopping list was a Violife cheese platter with some spicy chutney, plus some savoury crackers, again from the Co-Op. All that remains is for me to cook this lot and serve up a 100% vegan Christmas dinner, washed down with some vegan champagne of course; the only thing I bought in Intermarche!