A delicate Vegan Christmas Goose recipe - This traditional German 'Weihnachtsgans' recipe turned plant-based will excite everyone around the holiday table! The best vegan holiday roast you could have. The tender "meat" contains seitan and jackfruit. While the juicy filling is full of apples, onion, vegan wine, and wholesome seasoning. A festive and tasty dish, that is entirely cruelty-free!
💡 The recipe in a nutshell
- Vegan (eggless and dairy free)
- Best vegan Holiday roast
- Perfect for meal prep (make it one or two days ahead!)
- Festive, delicious, and fun
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👩🏽🍳 Story behind this recipe
Roasted Goose is one of the traditional meals eaten on Christmas Eve in Germany. A meal I grew up with as well. For the nostalgic flavors and feelings, I just had to veganize it! Even though it is one of my more complex recipes, I hope you guys enjoy this recipe.
🍎 Apple filling in red wine
Alongside the roast, we will also prepare an apple filling that is rich in red wine, oranges, onion, rosemary, and other festive spices. When buying your ingredients make sure the wine you buy is vegan.
🍷 Where to find vegan wine?
For many, it is a surprise to hear that wine-making includes animal products. This makes many common wines non-vegan. However, thankfully more and more brands change their old ways of making wine, so there is still plenty to choose from! Here is a list of vegan wine brands.
🇩🇪 Origin and tradition
The Christmas goose is a holiday meal traditionally served on Christmas Eve in Germany and other German-speaking countries.
There are many legends about this dish and who invented it. However, the origin of this roast goes back to the tradition of 'St. Martin's goose', which was eaten before the beginning of the Advent lent on November 11th. On Christmas Eve, this period ends and a goose is once again put on the table as a festive roast.
For more veganized classic German foods browse our recipe page. If you are looking for more plant-based holiday meals browse our holiday page.
🍽 Serving ideas
This vegan roast tastes great with German dumplings, classic German red cabbage, polenta fries, or potato gratin.
A great dessert idea is 'Herrencreme', which is a delightful dessert with vanilla pudding, (vegan) whipped cream, rum, and dark chocolate shavings.
🥣 Storage
Store any surplus leftovers in an air-tight container in your fridge for up to 5 days.
🎥 How-to video
📖 Recipe
Vegan Christmas Goose — Traditional German Recipe
Equipment
- pan for frying, dutch oven, food processor, tooth picks, shallow dish to soften rice paper
Ingredients
Vegan meat
- 1 can of jackfruit, drained and rinsed* (225g)
- 120 grams vital wheat gluten (1 cup)
- 50 grams tapioca starch (⅓ cup)
- 20 grams nutritional yeast (¼ cup)
- 1 teaspoon liquid smoke
- 1 teaspoon thyme
- 1 teaspoon onion powder
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 2 teaspoon poultry seasoning
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon black pepper
- 240 mililiters vegetable broth, more if needed (1 cup)
Rice paper skin
- 2 tablespoons vegan red wine (30ml)
- 5 tablespoons water (75ml)
- 2 teaspoon poultry seasoning
- 2 teaspoon vegetable broth (10ml)
- 2-3 sheets rice paper
Apple filling
- 3 yellow onions
- 4 apples
- Some oil for frying
- 2 teaspoon thyme (alternatively 4 thyme stems)
- 1 organic orange, and peel
- ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon cane sugar
- 100 mililiters vegan red wine (⅓ cup + 1 tbsp)
- 300 mililiters vegetable broth (1 ⅕ cup)
- Salt and pepper to taste
Frying stock
- 50 mililiters vegetable broth (¼ cup)
- 80 mililiters dark beer, or more vegetable broth (⅓ cup)
- ½ tablespoons dark balsamic vinegar
- 1 tablespoons dijon mustard
- ¼ teaspoon nutmeg
- ½ teaspoon pepper and salt
Instructions
Prepare filling:
- Peel the apples and onions and cut them into small cubes. Heat some oil in a pot and add the onion cubes and sauté until they become slightly translucent. Then add the apple pieces and stir in, sauté briefly. Deglaze with the red wine and reduce everything until almost all the liquid has disappeared, then fill up with the stock. Add the spices, orange peel, and cubed orange and bring to boil briefly. Remove the filling from the pot and set it aside.
Prepare vegan meat:
- In a food processor, add jackfruit (or beans of choice) and pulse 6 times for 3 seconds. Then add all remaining ingredients. Process for several minutes. You want the mixture to come together into a dough you can handle. If it seems too dry and is crumbly, add in some more vegetable broth (1 teaspoon at a time) until it comes together.
- Remove dough from food processor and place onto a clean dry surface. You can either let it rest overnight or knead it until it’s filled with ribbon from the vital wheat gluten (it takes around 20 minutes).
- Once the dough is ready divide the dough into 5 pieces: 1 large piece and 4 small pieces (for the legs). The leg and wing pieces should be about the length of your thumb and 2 x the width of your thumb. Roughly form into a goose. Don’t worry about the legs and wings not sticking to the large piece yet. Once we covered all pieces in rice paper skin we’ll attach them with toothpicks. Cover dough with a damp cloth to prevent drying while you prepare rice skin.
Prepare rice paper skin:
- Add all of the ingredients for the rice paper skin, except the rice paper, to a shallow dish or pie pan and whisk. Place one sheet of rice paper into the liquid and let it sit there until it becomes completely soft. This takes several minutes.
Assemble the "Goose":
- Gently lift the softened rice paper from the dish and place it on top of the large seitan pice and fold the edges of the rice paper up around the roast. Continue tucking or pressing the edges of the paper around the roast. The paper should be very soft and sticky and cling well to the dough.
- For the goose legs cut about a quarter out of the rice paper using scissors. This way the rice paper can easily be folded around the smaller pieces. Cover with more rice paper if needed. To prevent the vegan goose skin from getting wrinkles, you can cut small slits into the rice paper skin, or poke holes into it. Cut off excess rice paper.
- Pin the plant-based goose legs to the goose body with toothpicks. Tie them to the body with kitchen twine if needed. To do this, simply knot the twine around the goose. Just how you would do it with a real goose before it goes into the oven.
Cook the goose:
- Preheat oven to 200°C / 390°F top and bottom heat. Place apple filling that you set aside earlier into a dutch oven or large and high roaster. Whisk together all ingredients for the frying stock. Then pour in the frying stock. Now carefully place the vegan Christmas goose onto the filling.
- Cook covered in the preheated oven for 30 minutes. The vegan goose must not touch the lid, or bottom, otherwise, the skin will stick to it and tear off. Then remove the lid. Give the top of the roast a spray of oil or light brushing. Return to the oven and roast uncovered until the skin is nice and crispy. It takes around 40 minutes, but check on it regularly.
- Take out of the oven. You can serve it immediately, or rest covered overnight in the fridge and simply reheat on the day of serving. Flavors will enhance overnight and the seitan will firm up a bit more.To reheat the next day: Brush with some oil, add some liquid if needed, and pop it back in the oven on a baking sheet at 180°C / 355°F for 15 - 20 minutes (until hot). You can also slice the cold roast and reheat/fry the slices in a pan.
- Serve vegan goose hot, with sides of your choice and gravy.
Notes
The provided nutritional information is an estimate. Accuracy is not guaranteed.
Looks perfect for entertaining my vegan friends. I love the use of jackfruit as a meat replacement. Great recipe.
Thank you so much for your feedback!
haha i love that you even tried to shape it like a goose ! but bravo on this vegan version so yummy!
Thanks, Nancy! Not gonna lie, it was a bit odd to shape it into a bird, but I wanted to show the world there is nothing to miss on a plant based diet - even during the holidays!
Wow, this vegan goose looks so real 🙂 Love that you veganized this german recipe to make it entirely cruelty-free and meatless! Thanks for sharing it!
Thank you so much for your feedback!
Wow! I've never seen vegan goose before and I'm intrigued! This would be great for Christmas dinner!
Happy to hear I broadened your horizon with this recipe! Thank you for the feedback.
This recipe is awesome! Perfect for the holidays!
Thank you Andrea!
I would definitely love to try this. Altho I'm not skilled in crafting a shape of the goose, like you are. 🙂
You should definitely try, Natalie! It's not that hard to shape it into a goose, but you could also just shape it into a ball, or cylindrical shape. 🙂 Thank you for your lovely feedback.
Is there anything I could use as a substitute for the wine? I would just really prefer to stay away from any alcohol when cooking & stuff.
Hi Auggie, thank you so much for your question! The wine is an important part of the flavor of the sauce, however if you want to skip the alcohol I recommend using an alcohol-free wine, or 100% dark grape juice, pomegranate juice or cranberry juice. Another option would be to add more broth and some red wine vinegar. I hope this helps and happy cooking!