This popular dish for vegetarians has a crunchy bread crumb topping. Make it the focal point of your supper and serve it with mashed potatoes, English peas, and a flavorful vegetarian sauce.
| Prep Time: | 45 mins |
| Cook Time: | 50 mins |
| Total Time: | 1 hr 35 mins |
| Servings: | 6 |
| Yield: | 6 servings |
Ingredients
- 1 ⅛ cups green lentils
- 2 ¼ cups water
- 6 slices white bread, torn into small pieces
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup vegetable broth
- 2 tablespoons tomato paste
- ½ teaspoon dried basil
- ¼ teaspoon garlic powder
- ½ teaspoon ground black pepper
- 1 teaspoon dried parsley
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- ½ packet dry vegetable soup mix
- ⅓ cup dried bread crumbs
Instructions
- Combine lentils and water in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat, and simmer until tender, about 40 minutes.
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (205 degrees C). Grease a 9×5 inch loaf pan.
- In a large bowl, mix together 2 cups cooked lentils, bread, eggs, broth, tomato paste, basil, garlic powder, black pepper, parsley, olive oil, and dry soup mix. Spread into prepared pan.
- Bake for 40 minutes. Sprinkle top with dry bread crumbs, and continue baking another 10 minutes. Let sit for 10 minutes before serving.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 272 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 41 g |
| Cholesterol | 62 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 12 g |
| Protein | 15 g |
| Saturated Fat | 1 g |
| Sodium | 369 mg |
| Sugars | 4 g |
| Fat | 6 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
I added onions and cherry tomatoes and topped with barbecue sauce. Family enjoyed this one so make again with dash of garlic
Our family has multiple food allergies and one militant vegetarian so we have been trying to tweak this recipe to suit everyone’s tastes. I use ketchup in place of tomato paste, no basil, and sauté an onion with celery and carrots diced. I occasionally add diced parboiled potatoes and whole wheat bread when that’s what I have. We sometimes eat this with canned cranberries sauce or the vegetarian gravy from this site. This recipe is an excellent way to get my vegetarian daughter to eat protein.
I liked it, although a wee bit dry. My favourite carnivore says it’s ‘edible’, so that’s ok for him.
Will be making this again for thanksgiving this year. I think it’s a new holiday staple for us. Super easy to make and came out great. Wasn’t too dry. I followed the recipe to a T. We topped it with a mushroom gravy. The lentils add a great texture and the overall texture is very similar to meat loaf.
Was very good — will make it again. Had it with a cabbage salad. Added 8-10 whole garlic cloves and grated parmesan on top before baking. I also seasoned with crushed red pepper once served. Yummm.
Flavor was good, but it was super mushy. I had to cook it another 20 minutes, and it still crumbled apart. It was still good for ‘meatloaf’ sandwiches though. Next time I believe I’ll add less broth. I also just standard meatloaf seasoning instead of all the seasonings and ketchup for tomato sauce. Put it on ciabatta rolls with mustard and it was great.
My family and I are vegan so I substituted the 2 eggs w/flax eggs. This recipe is amazingly delicious! We love it and it’s definitely a staple in our home!!!
I’m giving this 5 stars because I will never make traditional meatloaf ever again. I made many changes and used suggestions found from other reviewers. For example, sautéing shredded carrot and diced onion and garlic and adding that. And using breadcrumbs instead of cubed bread. I baked mine for about 1 hr at 400 and then let it rest for 20 minutes. Came out of the pan better than any meatloaf I’ve ever made. My 3 year old crushed it (with no ketchup required) and my meat loving hubby had seconds. So ya. That’s a 5 star rating in my books.
I used 2 cans of green lentils, well drained.
Substitute ketchup for tomato and 2 tablespoons flax seed and 6 tablespoons water for the eggs. Let the water and flax sit for 1 hour before adding. Also toast the bread before tearing it up.
I loved this vegetarian meat loaf recipe! I did make a few changes to the original ingredients for the recipe to better suit what I actually had in my pantry. I used brown lentils instead of green, whole wheat sandwich bread instead of white, and I did not add the dry soup base, rather I just added extra of each spice/herb listed. I also added some steak seasoning because I think it helps match the taste of traditional meat loaf without any of the meat. Served with ketchup just like traditional meat loaf, and I thought this tasted fantastic!
I just made this recipe. Fantastic! I added 1/2 c chopped mushrooms, liquid smoke, mesquite seasoning, 1/4 c chopped walnuts. And I also made a new flavored gravy. The flavours turned out great. Thank you for the recipe. I will be doing this many mores times again. Oh, by the way, I’m not a vegetarian! Lol.
Turned out great! Sprinkled a little cheese on top.
bland
I read a few of the reviews before making this recipe. I added an extra egg and used ketchup instead of tomato paste. For the dry soup I used Cheddar potato. I sauteed: half an onion finely diced, 2 garlic cloves finely diced, 1-2 carrots shredded and 4-5 mushrooms finely chopped and added those in. I also mixed in a sprinkling of mozzarella cheese. When it came time to add the bread crumbs, I used Panko Italian Style and also sprinkled a little more mozzarella cheese on top. I whipped up a quick vegetarian brown gravy to go with it, and this was delicious! My husband and I both enjoyed it very much, and I will be making it for us to eat at Thanksgiving dinner in place of turkey.
Not being a vegetarian I was hesitant at first to try this recipe. I had a bag of unused lentils so I thought I’d try it. I adjusted slightly as the other reviewers suggested and it turned out amazing! Smells great and tasted just as good! I highly recommend this for all.
Dry
By far the best receipe I’ve tried yet for lentil loaf. the only changes I made were to use 1/2 c bread crumbs instead of slices of bread, 2 T ketchup instead of tomato paste, added 1/2 onion along with some chopped celery, carrot & green pepper. I also spread extra ketchup on top before baking. Yum!
This was very good. I’ve tried a few “meat”loaf recipes and this one turned out the best. I did add sauteed fresh garlic, fresh onion, fresh carrots, and fresh rosemary. I took the other reviewers suggestions and swapped ketchup for tomato paste and did 3 eggs rather than 2. I didn’t have bread around so used 1/2 Cup Italian breadcrumbs like another reviewer suggested. I ended up not adding the broth because adding a cup of liquid i thought would make in really runny. It came out a little too dry as a result but i do think 1 cup of broth would have been too much. Next time i’ll boil the lentils veggie broth and then I won’t drain them. I think that would have been the perfect amount of liquid. Also, i didn’t do the final bread crumb crust – that seemed like too much to me. VERY GOOD!
Loved this recipe. I added some chopped roasted red peppers and topped with tomato basil sauce. It was really good and I plan on adding this to my list of Meatless Monday favorites.
Okay, so I totally misread this recipe. I put the bread crumbs in at the beginning before realizing that I was supposed to put in BREAD. So, I added grated carrot and onion & an extra egg for added moisture, and set the timer for 45 mins. While it was cooking, I mixed 1TB Balsamic Vinegar, 1TB Maple Syrup, and 3 TB Catsup. Sprinkled that on top of the loaf fresh from the oven, and stuck it back in for 1 min. Freaking delicious.