This vegan meatloaf is the best ever. It’s hearty, satisfying, loaded with flavor and glazed with a sweet and spicy tomato sauce.
I can hardly even believe how good this vegan meatloaf is.
Even before it’s cooked it’s so darn good. Don’t taste the mix before you cook it, you guys! You’ll just want to eat it just like that, and you can too.
It’s all vegan and ‘pre-cooked’ so nothing bad would even happen if you did, but rather have patience because it gets even better when cooked.
And if you like this recipe then also check out our vegan nut roast.
How To Make Vegan Meatloaf
You will find full instructions and measurements in the recipe card at the bottom of the post. This is a summary of the process to go along with the process photos.
- Sauté onions and garlic in olive oil until softened.
- Mash up chickpeas with a fork or a potato masher, the object being to keep it quite chunky but not too chunky.
- Add breadcrumbs, soy sauce, sweet chili sauce, dijon mustard, ground flaxseed, nutritional yeast, garlic powder, tomato paste and cayenne pepper to the chickpeas in the mixing bowl. Add the cooked onions and garlic.
- Mix it into a thick batter.
- Transfer it to a parchment lined loaf pan and smooth it down.
- Bake it at 375°F for 30 minutes covered with foil.
- While it’s baking mix up your tomato glaze. Add tomato paste, brown sugar, maple syrup, garlic powder and paprika to a bowl and stir together.
- When the meatloaf has baked for 30 minutes, remove the foil and spread the tomato glaze on top.
- Put it back in the oven to bake for another 15 minutes (uncovered) and voilá!
Chef’s Tips
Breadcrumbs. We used homemade breadcrumbs – and when I say ‘homemade’, I mean I put some sliced bread in the blender and made breadcrumbs. I used 4 slices of a regular pre-sliced thick cut sandwich bread for the breadcrumbs. It makes around 2 cups of homemade breadcrumbs. We just put the bread in the blender and pulse blend it to get breadcrumbs.
If you use a store-bought version of breadcrumbs such as panko breadcrumbs instead then you will need much less, in the region of 1 cup. This is because store-bought breadcrumbs are more dry than freshly made breadcrumbs. So if you’re using store-bought breadcrumbs then use only as much as you need to get the consistency that you can see in our photos.
Line your dish with parchment paper. It’s crucial to line your loaf pan with parchment paper, and not just line it, but have a parchment paper overhang so that you can lift the entire meatloaf out of the pan using the parchment paper.
This is necessary because the meatloaf isn’t super firm when it comes out of the oven, and the glaze on top is still quite wet, so you can’t be tipping it over onto your wire cooling rack the way you would with a loaf of home baked bread.
Let it cool for around 10 minutes after coming out of the oven, and then you just lift it right out with the parchment paper onto a wire cooling rack, let it cool for another 10 minutes and then serve.
How To Serve Vegan Meatloaf
This meatloaf is wonderful served with some vegan mashed potatoes or vegan mashed sweet potatoes or vegan stuffing, or alongside a delicious salad like our vegan kale salad or roasted butternut squash salad.
It doesn’t need gravy because it’s not at all dry, but if you do want to serve it with gravy, that would be awesome too. Especially if you’ve got some mashed potatoes on the side.
We have a wonderful vegan gravy recipe and a vegan mushroom gravy recipe, and either of those would be great. If you want to serve this with gravy you could forego the tomato glaze, but it’s so good I don’t recommend missing out on it.
Make Ahead, Storing and Freezing
Make Ahead: You can make this up to the point that you would bake it, then just cover and refrigerate for up to 2 days, and then bake it when you’re ready.
Storing: Leftovers are amazing! So you will love love love having leftovers of this! Keep it in the fridge (covered) for 4-5 days. You can serve it cold or reheat it as you like.
Freezing: It is freezer friendly for up to 3 months. Wrap it well and freeze. Thaw overnight in the fridge and then reheat in the oven until warmed through.
More Vegan Dinner Recipes
- Baked Vegan Mac and Cheese
- The Best Vegan Lasagna
- Vegan Moussaka
- Vegan Pasta Bake
- Vegan Risotto
- Vegan Shepherds Pie
Did you make this recipe? Be sure to leave a comment and rating below!
Vegan Meatloaf
Ingredients
Vegan Meatloaf:
- 1 Tablespoon Olive Oil
- 1 teaspoon Crushed Garlic
- 1 Small Onion (100g) White, Yellow or Brown, finely chopped
- 2 (15-ounce) Cans Chickpeas Drained (3 cups)
- 4 Slices Brown or Whole Wheat Bread (160g) processed into breadcrumbs (see notes*)
- 2 Tablespoons Dark Soy Sauce
- 2 Tablespoons Sweet Chili Sauce
- 1 Tablespoon Dijon Mustard
- 2 Tablespoons Ground Flaxseed Meal
- 2 Tablespoons Nutritional Yeast
- 1 teaspoon Garlic Powder
- 3 Tablespoons Tomato Paste
- ¼ teaspoon Cayenne Pepper
Tomato Glaze:
- ¼ cup Tomato Paste (56g)
- 1 Tablespoon Light Brown Sugar
- ½ Tablespoon Maple Syrup
- ½ teaspoon Garlic Powder
- ¼ teaspoon Salt
- ¼ teaspoon Paprika
For Serving:
- Fresh Basil Optional
Instructions
- Add the chopped onion and crushed garlic to a frying pan with the olive oil and sauté until the onions are softened.
- Preheat the oven to 375°F (190°C). Spray a loaf pan with non-stick spray and line it with parchment paper so that the meatloaf can be easily lifted out. Set aside.
- Drain the chickpeas and add to a mixing bowl. Mash with a fork or potato masher until roughly mashed.
- Make your breadcrumbs by breaking up the 4 slices of bread and placing into a blender and pulse blending until it makes breadcrumbs (see notes*).
- Add the breadcrumbs, soy sauce, sweet chili sauce, dijon mustard, flaxseed meal, nutritional yeast, garlic powder, tomato paste and cayenne pepper to the mixing bowl. Add in the cooked onions and garlic. Mix very well into a thick batter. Make sure everything is evenly mixed (it’s a very thick mix). Transfer this into the parchment lined loaf pan and smooth down with the back of a spoon.
- Cover with foil and bake for 30 minutes.
- While the meatloaf is baking, mix the tomato paste, brown sugar, maple syrup, garlic powder, salt and paprika in a bowl and stir together.
- When the meatloaf has baked for 30 minutes, remove it from the oven and remove the foil. Spread on the tomato glaze evenly and return it to the oven, (no foil, uncovered) to bake for a further 15 minutes.
- Remove from the oven and allow to cool for at least 10 minutes before removing from the loaf pan by lifting the meatloaf out with the parchment paper. Let it cool for another 10 minutes.
- Slice and serve with fresh basil.
Video
Notes
- I used 4 slices of a regular pre-sliced thick cut sandwich bread for the breadcrumbs. This makes around 2 cups of homemade breadcrumbs. If you use a store-bought version of breadcrumbs such as panko breadcrumbs then you will only need only around 1 cup breadcrumbs since store-bought breadcrumbs are more dry than freshly made breadcrumbs. Use only as much as you need to get the meatloaf mix to the consistency that you see in our photos in the blog post above. Chickpeas can also vary in their moisture content, so being a little flexible with this is important.
- The tomato glaze is so good that we sometimes double it and use all of it for a thicker tomato glaze topping! If you like it as much as we do, you might want to do the same.
- This recipe was first published in March 2018. It has been slightly updated with extra tips and notes.
I made this loaf tonight. It wasn’t as pretty as yours, but it was delicious. I can’t wait until tomorrow. I’m looking forward to a cold “meatloaf” sandwich with lots of vegan mayo. I used a 1.5 cups of store bought bread crumbs, a couple of drops of water, and chili garlic sauce (with the rooster on the jar) instead of sweet chili sauce and it was perfect. The sauce added to the top at the end, I could’ve eaten it with a spoon! Thanks for a great recipe. I will be adding it to my rotation.
Awesome Laurie! Thanks so much for sharing and the fantastic review. xo
Are you supposed to mix the flax with water so it can work as a flax “egg” binder?
Hi Melissa, no, we don’t do that in this recipe, we just use the ground flaxseed as is. All the best! 🙂
I made this as directed and it had good flavor but on the dry side. If I make it again I will use half the amount of bread crumbs. I even added an extra ounce of water to the soy sauce measure cuz it seemed dry before I put it in the oven. But thank-you for your recipes, I have printed many of them. ?
Hi Jan, so glad it had good flavor but I am concerned about it being dry. Did you also use homemade breadcrumbs or store-bought? I am wondering if this could be the differentiating factor, I wouldn’t have thought it would make a difference but maybe I’m wrong. Thanks very much! 🙂
Hi back, yes I used half Panko and half regular ( store bought). That’s a good point, they would be much drier then homemade…..I will make my own next time. Thanks for your feedback, I am a new vegan and on a learning curve when cooking.
Thanks Jan! I will update the recipe, I thought they would be interchangeable but now I think I was wrong about that, thanks so much for letting me know! 🙂
Hi
I’ve just made the meatloaf but the mixture was a pile of breadcrumbs even though I followed the recipe exactly. Any idea what went wrong? I’ve made many other recipes by you and all have been absolutely brilliant.
Many thanks
Hi Helen, I’m not sure what you mean, do you mean it wouldn’t mix properly before it went into the oven? I would just add a bit more liquid, even just a spoonful of water to make it mix, the mix is supposed to be fairly dry as you can see in the video, but it definitely is supposed to mix.
The glaze is delicious! I agree that you need to make a double batch for the glaze on this recipe!
Hahaha yes the glaze is so tasty! So glad you enjoyed it! Thanks so much for posting Stacey. 🙂
I would love to make this recipe- it looks so good- but we are doing Bright Line eating, so we can’t have the bread crumbs. What do you think would be a good, non-bread option to replace them with?
Thank you!
Lisa
Hi Lisa, I’m thinking maybe rolled oats could work (I would add them to a blender or food processor to process them down to small pieces similar to breadcrumbs) or you could try cooked rice, or cooked quinoa or cooked couscous. Alternatively you could try something like walnuts, I mean that would change it totally but it could be very good! Crush them first and for all of these use in the same quantity as the breadcrumbs. I haven’t tried any of these options so am just guessing on what might work. If you find something that works great please let us know, I’m sure it would be helpful to others as well. 🙂
Thank you so much. I like all of those suggestions. I’ll ket you know how it turns out. ?
I made this recently and shared it with my non vegan co workers. Everyone LOVED it. I made mashed potatoes with it and some nutritional yeast gravy. It was so good. Can’t wait to make it again.
Awesome to hear that Sheila! Thanks so much for sharing! 🙂
Can you use small red beans instead of chickpeas
I have no idea, it would be an experiment to try that! 🙂
Thank you for this delicious recepie. We loved it .
I’ve made this several times now and each time it gets better. Along with the Tbs. Sweet Chili Sauce in the tomato topping I also add just a Tbs or so to the chickpea mixture also. Even my non-vegan friends enjoy it. Thanks Allison for so many wonderful recipes. I’ll be commenting on others that I’ve made too.
So glad you like the recipe, and so glad even your non-vegan friends have enjoyed it! Thanks for posting Bob! 🙂
So delicious – especially the glaze on top. Already thinking about what else I can use that on. Next time, I might try adding another tablespoon or two of breadcrumbs, just to see if it helps firm it up a bit. So true – it was absolutely fabulous cold the next day, too!
I wasn’t sure about how much onion to use. Ended up using a fairly large one (maybe one cup, chopped?) and it was not too much at all.
So glad you liked it Linda! Definitely tweak it to your preference! Thanks for posting! 🙂
This is sooo good. Great texture and flavor. Added some sundried tomatoes and sage just because I love both ?
Smart! Love those additions! Thanks so much for sharing! 🙂
Made this loaf for dinner tonight and it was great! Added some chopped walnuts for texture. Thank you so much for all the recipes! They always work out so well!!
Chopped walnuts is a great idea for this! Love it! Thanks for sharing! 🙂
A hearty, delicious meal!
Amazing and non vegans love it too!!! I’m so thrilled to have discovered Lovingitvegan! My life is so much happier partly because I get to cook with my boyfriend in trying these exciting recipes!