Smoky-salty-crunchy vegan bacon recipes, using everything from mushrooms to tofu to rice paper and more! Find the best vegan bacon for every occasion.
If you're missing the smoky-salty-savory flavor of bacon, these vegan bacon recipes have you covered! There are so many options to choose from, so browse the list and see which one works best for you.
Vegan bacon recipes
Smoky shiitake mushroom bacon
Vegan bacon bits recipe
Vegan Canadian Bacon
Rice Paper Bacon
Coconut Bacon
Roasted Chickpea Bacon
Carrot Rashers
Maple Seitan Bacon
💬 Frequently asked questions
There's a joke that vegans will make bacon out of anything, and it's funny because it's true! We'll use everything from tofu to carrots to cashews to rice paper to make crispy-crunchy vegan bacon recipes.
Vegans love bacon, because vegans are humans. What we don't love is hurting animals just to make that smoky, sweet breakfast staple. And there is no need to do that with so many delicious vegan bacon options out there!
There's a perception that eating vegan is some kind of contest to see who can eat the most "pure" diet, free from anything fun and flavorful. That couldn't be further from the truth! Sure, there are vegans out there following very restrictive diets, but most vegans just want to feed our faces without harming animals.
If vegan bacon seems like an oxymoron to you, I encourage you to read my friend Cadry's great article about why so many vegans eat meat and cheese alternatives. The tl;dr version is that vegan meat tastes good, and vegans like food that tastes good. You can also check out my article on the vegan police, so you can stop being a cop.
Some more than others. Really, it's all about your personal tastes, so check out the vegan bacon recipes above and see which ones speak to you!
🥣 Making bacon flavoring
Creating vegan bacon is all about balancing your smoky, salty, and sweet flavors and a bit of acidity. You can approach the five flavors that make up vegan bacon in a number of different ways, and the recipes above showcase many of the delicious options available to you.
Smoky
For the smoky flavor, liquid smoke is the easiest choice. Liquid smoke is made by burning wood or charcoal, then using a condenser to capture that flavor in water.
If you don't want to use liquid smoke, you have other great, smoky options out there: mild chipotle chili powder or smoked paprika.
Salty
You can use salt, miso, soy sauce or any other salty staples to give your vegan bacon its signature saltiness.
Since most vegan bacon recipes start by marinating your main ingredient, I tend to go with soy sauce. The liquid helps give your bacony marinade more volume.
Sweet
For the sweet part of your vegan bacon's flavor profile, you have as many options as there are sweeteners. I like using maple syrup, but you can use agave nectar, brown sugar, or even white sugar.
For my tofu bacon, I use maple syrup and balsamic vinegar. The balsamic brings sweetness and a nice acidity to the mix.
Slightly Acidic
Speaking of acid! You want some in your vegan bacon recipe. Vinegar, lemon juice, and lime juice are all great options here.
Fatty
Adding oil to your vegan bacon recipe is optional, but I recommend it, if you do oil. Conventional bacon is greasy, so if you want your vegan bacon to mimic that, don't skimp.
Refined coconut oil, olive oil, or neutral cooking oils all work well in vegan bacon recipes. You can use unrefined coconut oil, if you don't mind your bacon tasting coconutty.
If you don't do oil, nut butter is a great way to add some fat to your vegan bacon without oil. The rice paper bacon recipe above uses a nut butter marinade to get that fatty goodness with no added oil.
Lisa
Sorry if my eyes are playing tricks on me. But. Do you have a receipe for seitan bacon?
Becky Striepe
My site has one for tofu bacon! There are a couple of seitan bacon recipes from other sites on the list above, though.
Linda from Veganosity
This is exactly what I needed to see today! I flew out of O'Hare this morning and EVERY single restaurant had big piles of bacon on display. Thank you for this wonderful roundup and for including our Portobello Bacon recipe. I'm going to share this and try everyone of the recipes.
Becky Striepe
Hooray! Enjoy the smoky-salty-sweet goodness, Linda!