Growing up (vegetarian) our Christmas meal didn’t resemble the ‘norm’. Sure lunch at the Grandparents was pretty traditional, but my family only ate the salads, vegetable sides and mums silverbeet + feta filo pie she’d take along to my Grandparents without fail, every year. Us kids would hurry to grab a slice before the rest of our extended family got in, knowing it would be the most substantial part of our meal (gosh, not that we ever went hungry with all the amazing desserts my Nana made!).
Eating gluten-free and pretty much totally dairy-free nowadays means I haven’t had mums infamous pie in decades, but that’s ok cause I like to just make an assortment of substantial vegetable sides and salads and call that a meal, followed by dessert of course.
Below, you’ll find 20 of my favourite flavour-packed vegetarian sides and salads, some are ones I’ve shared on this site over the years, while others I’ve created for my regular column in Cuisine Magazine over the past 3 years. I hope they provide some inspiration and encourage you to make vegetables the main event this Christmas! I’ll round up some of my favourite sweet treats next week too, so stand-by for that X
