Vegan Valentine's Recipes

A vegan cheese board or charcuterie board for Valentine's Day is honestly one of the most stunning and low-effort ways to start a romantic evening.

The key is variety, but also quality. Aim for 2-3 different vegan cheeses with contrasting textures, like a creamy cashew brie, a firm aged nut-based cheese, and a spreadable herbed cheese.

Round it out with crackers, or grilled sour dough points, fresh fruit like figs, grapes, and sliced pears, some marcona almonds, good olives, artichoke hearts, some homemade garlic butter or a little jam. The visual does most of the heavy lifting, and the whole thing can be assembled ahead of time.

If you want to go full next-level and actually make your own vegan cheeses from scratch, my Vegan Dairy Crash Course is the perfect place to start, and my Plant-Based Cheese School on-demand class goes even deeper into the art of cultured, aged, and melty vegan cheeses that'll make your board absolutely pop off.

Full disclosure: I don't drink alcohol, so this is one of those areas where I'm drawing on years of catering weddings and events rather than personal experience swirling glasses. That said, here's what I've learned.

Not all wine is vegan, and most people have no idea. During the winemaking process, traditional fining agents used to clarify wine are often animal-based, including egg whites, casein from milk, gelatin from animal bones, and isinglass derived from fish bladders. 🤢

The good news is that finding a vegan bottle for Valentine's Day is genuinely not hard. Reliably vegan labels to look for include Natura, Layer Cake, and Bonny Doon, and for something more celebratory, both Moët & Chandon and Veuve Clicquot produce vegan-friendly Champagne.

When in doubt, Barnivore.com is my go-to resource for looking up whether a specific wine, beer, or spirit is vegan before you buy it.

The word "yet" is doing a lot of heavy lifting in this question, and I respect it. Because sooner or later, with enough yummy food, that person you love will learn to love animals enough not to eat them.

The move here is to cook something so absurdly good that the whole "but where's the meat?" thought never even crosses their mind. Think a showstopping pasta, a ridiculously rich mushroom Wellington, or a chocolate dessert so good it becomes a core memory.

This is genuinely one of the best opportunities you'll ever have to prove what plant-based cooking can actually do: romantic setting, captive audience, and someone who is already predisposed to being impressed by you. Don't waste it on anything safe or boring! Go all in, make it beautiful, and let the food do the talking.