Vegan Thanksgiving Dinner Cake

This vegan thanksgiving dinner cake comprises 5 layers of common thanksgiving menu items: vegan turkey, stuffing, brussel sprouts, mashed potatoes, and gravy. It’s the perfect thanksgiving centerpiece for a friendsgiving or thanksgiving dinner.

This recipe makes 8 servings.

Table of Contents

(click the links below to skip to the section you’re looking for)

• Thanksgiving Tofu
• Thanksgiving Tofu Marinade
• Vegan Stuffing
• Brussels Sprouts
• Mashed Potatoes and Gravy
• Ingredient Substitutions
• Contact Me with Questions
• Similar Recipes

I’ve been vegan for 19 years now, and I’ve probably been making my own tofurkey for at least 10 of those years. This year, I wanted to do something different, and I’m SO EXCITED that I did.

This vegan savory cake can easily be made gluten-free by making a gluten-free stuffing and using a starch to thicken the gravy instead of flour.

There are basically 6 parts to making this: the tofu, the marinade, the stuffing, the brussel sprouts, the mashed potatoes, and the gravy. Even though it seems like a lot, I still made this entire thing in under 5 hours, which is way less time than it would take me to make a thanksgiving dinner. I recommend serving it with bunny biscuits.

If you want to make this the day before you plan to serve it, here’s my suggestion. Before making the mashed potatoes, leave it in the springform pan in your fridge overnight. Go ahead and make the gravy the day before, and store it in a covered container in the fridge too. Then the next day, heat the thanksgiving cake in the oven at 350º for about 30 minutes while you make the mashed potatoes for the top. Reheat the gravy on the stove with a whisk.

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Ingredients for Tofurkey Recipe

(jump to the substitutions section to see ingredient details and suggestions for substitutions)

• 2 pounds extra-firm organic tofu
• ½ teaspoon garlic powder
• ½ teaspoon onion powder
• ½ teaspoon salt
• ½ teaspoon smoked sea salt

How to Make Tofurkey

prep time: 15 min

Rinse the tofu and wrap each block in a kitchen tea towel. Leave wrapped as long as possible, preferably overnight in the fridge. After they sit, while wrapped in towels, squeeze to get extra moisture out of tofu. Crumble tofu into a bowl.

Add garlic, onion, salt, and smoked sea salt to the tofu. Mix.

Preheat oven to 400º.

Line a springform pan with cheesecloth (or if you don’t have cheesecloth, use parchment paper or just make sure to grease the pan really really well).

Press the tofu into the pan to cover the bottom and sides with tofu approximately ½ – 1” thick, depending on the size of your mold. Press with your fist and/or palm to make sure it’s packed tightly.

Ingredients for Marinade Recipe

(jump to the substitutions section to see ingredient details and suggestions for substitutions)

• ¼ cup olive oil
• ½ cup braggs liquid aminos

How to Make the Marinade for the Tofu Turkey

prep time: 5 min | bake time: 20 min

Combine ¼ cup olive oil and ½ cup braggs liquid aminos to make marinade.

Brush the entire surface area of the tofu with the marinade using a silicone basting brush if you have one.

Bake at 400º for 20 minutes.

Vegan Stuffing Layer

prep time: 15 min | bake time: 2 hours

Make the stuffing using this vegan stuffing recipe.

Remove the tofu from the oven, baste with marinade, and fill with stuffing.

Bake at 400º for 30 minutes.

Vegan Brussel Sprouts Layer

prep time: 10 min | bake time: 20-30 minutes

Toss 2 pounds of destemmed brussel sprouts with oil, balsamic vinegar, and spices, and bake them in the oven while the tofurkey and stuffing are baking, but on the shelf just below. If your family doesn’t like brussel sprouts, you can use destemmed and chopped green beans instead.

Remove both items from the oven after 20-30 minutes, and transfer the brussel sprouts to the top of the cake.

Slide a silicone spatula down the sides of the pan between the cake and the springform pan to make sure it isn’t sticking before you release the sides.

Remove the sides of the pan (and peel off your parchment paper or cheesecloth if you used it).

Vegan Mashed Potatoes and Gravy Layers

prep time: 30 min | cook time: 50 minutes

Follow the directions in my vegan mashed potatoes and gravy recipe to make the mashed potatoes and vegan gravy. I recommend making one change though. When you make the mashed potatoes, I would peel the potatoes. For this recipe, I only used peeled potatoes (and no other added veggies), because I wanted them to pipe really well and look pretty.

Spread the mashed potatoes smoothly across the top of the cake, filling in any gaps between the brussel sprouts.

Transfer the remaining mashed potatoes to a piping bag fitted with your large tip of choice. I used my favorite Wilton star tip 1M for the cake you see in these photos.

Pipe little dollops of potatoes around the top of your thanksgiving dinner cake.

Drizzle gravy over the top of the cake until it runs down the sides.

Ingredient Substitutions

• Tofu: I used 2 pounds of extra-firm organic tofu for this recipe. I like to buy mine at Costco because it’s only $8 for 4 pounds.
• Smoked Sea Salt: You can replace the ½ teaspoon smoked sea salt in this recipe with ½ teaspoon of pink sea salt and 3 shakes of liquid smoke.
• Oil: I recommend using olive, avocado, safflower, or sunflower oil. However, you can use any other oil such as coconut oil, vegetable oil, canola oil, grapeseed oil, etc.
• Braggs Liquid Aminos: You can replace this with ½ cup soy sauce if needed.
• Brussel Sprouts: I buy the 2 pound-bag of organic brussel sprouts from costsco because they’re only like $6. If your family doesn’t like brussel sprouts, you can use destemmed and chopped green beans instead.

Comments or Questions?

If you make this recipe, I would love it if you’d snap a pic, post to instagram, and tag me @vegandollhouse. It seriously makes my day/week/month!

Please message me (instagram or email) if you have any questions or feedback about the recipe.

Similar Recipes

If you happen to have any leftovers, I suggest reading my blog post about how to make thanksgiving leftovers sandwiches.

If this seems like too much work, you might prefer my thanksgiving tofu recipe that is a more traditional tofurky with stuffing recipe.

I recommend serving this with my crustless pumpkin pie for dessert.

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