Vegan meatballs, made with 8 ingredients and a delicious homemade marinara sauce. They’re gluten-free and so easy to make.
These vegan meatballs will blow your mind. They’re SO good! Super flavorful and rich, this recipe sure is a keeper. Besides, they only require 8 ingredients and go so well with the marinara sauce.
It is a pretty simple way of making meatballs and you can incorporate any veggies, spices, herbs, or ingredients you want. Hope you like them!
Ingredient tips
- Oats: I used quick oats, but any kind will do.
- Black beans: feel free to use canned black beans or cook them from scratch. Any other beans are also okay.
- Nutritional yeast: if you can’t find it, you could also use brewer’s yeast. However, nutritional yeast is the best choice.
- Flax egg: it’s an egg replacer made with flaxseeds and water. It’s so easy to make and ready in 5 minutes.
- Vegetable stock or water: I prefer vegetable broth because it enhances the flavor of this dish. However, water is okay too. I do suggest you make your own vegetable stock at home, but store-bought will also work.
Dietary variations
- Make it gluten-free: use gluten-free oats.
- Make it oil-free: feel free to sautée the meatballs with no oil if you use a non-stick skillet. You could also add a little bit of vegetable stock or water instead.
Pro tips
- Feel free to customize your vegan meatball recipe with your favorite spices or herbs, such as dried oregano, fresh basil, or thyme.
- Marinara sauce goes really well with meatballs, but any other sauce will do.
- You could also incorporate ingredients like onions, mushrooms, tomatoes, or even panko breadcrumbs.
How to make vegan meatballs
- Add the oats to a regular blender and pulse until they are ground into a powder-like consistency. Set aside.
- Add all the meatball ingredients to a food processor and blend until well combined. If you don’t have a food processor, add them to a large mixing bowl and mash with a potato masher, a fork, or use an immersion blender.
- Get the mixture and make balls with your hands (I made 30). Add to a plate and refrigerate for 15 minutes.
- Heat a little bit of oil in a large skillet or frying pan and sautée the meatballs over medium-high heat until golden brown.
- Incorporate the marinara sauce and the vegetable stock, stir, and bring to a boil.
- Cook the meatballs in the sauce over medium-high heat for about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.
- Serve your vegan meatballs immediately.
How to store vegan meatballs
- Fridge: store the leftovers in an airtight container in the refrigerator for 5-7 days.
- Freezer: keep them in an airtight container in the freezer for up to 1 month. Thaw in the fridge overnight.
- Reheat: reheat in the microwave or in the oven at 375ºF or 190ºC until warmed through.
Are vegan meatballs healthy?
As always, it depends on the ingredients used. This recipe, though, is healthy and nutritious!
Serving suggestions
Feel free to serve your vegan meatballs with pasta like spaghetti and top it with vegan Parmesan cheese.
Looking for more vegan meat recipes?
Did you make this vegan meatball recipe?
Please leave a comment and rate it below. We’d love to hear from you!
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Vegan Meatballs
- Prep: 30 mins
- Cook: 35 mins
- Total: 1 hour 5 mins
- 30 meatballs 1x
- Main dish
- Italian
- Vegan
Servings 30 meatballs 1x
Vegan meatballs, made with 8 ingredients and a delicious homemade marinara sauce. They’re gluten-free and so easy to make.
Ingredients
For the vegan meatballs:
- 2 15-ounce cans pinto beans (850 g), drained and rinsed
- 1 cup breadcrumbs (110 g), you can use gluten-free or oat flour instead
- 1/2 cup nutritional yeast (8 tbsp)
- 2 cloves of garlic, minced
- 1 tbsp fresh parsley, finely chopped
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/8 tsp ground black pepper
- 1 flax egg
For the sauce:
- 2 batches of marinara sauce (about 4 cups or 960 ml)
- 3 cups of vegetable stock or water (720 ml)
Instructions
- Add all the meatball ingredients to a food processor and blend until well combined. If you don’t have a food processor, add them to a large mixing bowl and mash with a potato masher, or a fork, or use an immersion blender.
- Make balls with your hands (I made 16). Add to a plate and refrigerate for 15 minutes.
- Heat a little bit of oil (I used 1 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil) in a skillet or frying pan and sautée the meatballs over medium-high heat until golden brown. If you don’t consume oil, bake them at 350ºF or 180ºC until golden brown. Set aside.
- Add the marinara sauce and the vegetable stock to the skillet or frying pan, stir and bring to a boil.
- Cook the meatballs in the sauce over medium-high heat for about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.
- Serve your vegan meatballs immediately (I added some chopped fresh parsley on top), and store the leftovers in an airtight container in the fridge for 5-7 days, or in the freezer for 1 month. Thaw overnight in the fridge.
Notes
- Add your favorite fresh or dried herbs and spices.
- Marinara sauce goes really well with meatballs, but any other sauce will do.
- You could only use the marinara sauce instead of a combination of vegetable stock and marinara sauce, but I prefer my sauce not to be too thick, so I’m in love with this combo.
- Nutritional info has been calculated by using 1 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil to cook the meatballs.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 5 meatballs
- Calories: 355
- Sugar: 6.4 g
- Sodium: 1259 mg
- Fat: 8.6 g
- Saturated Fat: 1.7 g
- Carbohydrates: 53.4 g
- Fiber: 15.6 g
- Protein: 21.2 g
Update Notes: This post was originally published in December of 2018, but was republished with new photos, step-by-step instructions, and tips in September of 2022.
Hi! Do you think a can of fat free refried beans would work? Also, I have a flax/chia blend. Both get gummy! Do you think that would work to hold the m’eat balls together?
Hi Linda! Feel free to use a can of fat-free refried beans 🙂 Also, I think it is possible to use a flax/chia blend.
Do you think the flavor profile of these veggie meatballs would go with bbq sauce as well as the marinara?
Hi Amelia! I think it could work 🙂
This has become a staple in our vegan/omnivore mix household! I add 2 rsp of liquid smoke to the meatball mixture and mushroom stock to the marinara which kicks it up a notch for me. I prefer this dish to traditional meatball for sure! Thank you!
★★★★★
Hi! Sounds so good 🙂 I’m glad you liked it!
I like the looks of your meat-balls, I have a can of black-beans in the pantry, so I will use that …..I will take a photo of the finished dish and sent to you..do let me know how I can do this as I am new to this sort of thing…Thanks….Querino
Hi! Have you got Instagram? Feel free to send the photo by DM (direct message) 🙂
This looks great! I’m not trying to be dumb, but the oats go in the meatballs right? It just says to set them aside but not what to do with them! Looking forward to trying this!
Hi Mandy! You have to add it to the food processor with the rest of the ingredients 🙂 Hope I have helped you and hope you like it!
Love them so delicious
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Hi Elissa! Thanks for your comment 🙂 So glad you loved our vegan meatballs! Have a nice day!
I just made these with 50% chickpeas and 50% black beans because it all I had. LOVING them! Eating them as I type this! Thank you for being such a reliable blog for my dinners!
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Wow, Kristin! Thank you for your kind words 🙂 So glad you liked our meatballs and our blog!
I made this very nutritious and easy recipe tonight. Not sure what I did wrong, but they were a bit gooey. So I chopped them up like a ‘mince’ and it was delicious. I cheated and used ready made sauce. Still delicious.
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HI Bev! Try to add more oats next time 🙂
wanted to let you know I thought this recipe was fantastic, didn’t have nutritional yeast or flax but worked out fine, was a bit dry just added liquid. Even my husband (who is a meat lover) said they were well edible. Can’t wait to try again, maybe with extra veg. I think if you like mushrooms they would go well.
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Hi Debbie! Thank you so much for your comment 🙂
Hi, I’m going to try these but my question is: Can they be frozen and if so before cooking??
Cheers 🙂
Hi Barbara! Yes they can, but I think it’s better to freeze them after cooking 🙂
I made these for a person recovering from cancer who is following a plant based diet. They are easy to make and delicious. So tasty that they disappeared long before my turkey meatballs! Thank you for sharing your recipes!!
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Hi Betsy! You’re so welcome 🙂 Hope he/she gets better really soon!
It’s a very tasty recipe and it turned out great. But I don’t understand I could only make 12 meatballs of that even though they were small. Otherwise perfect texture and taste. Thank you 🙂
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Hi Kristina! I’m so glad you enjoyed them 🙂
Hmm, this didn’t quite work out for us. My daughter liked them though asked for them to be smaller. She didn’t quite care for the gummy texture. Neither my son nor I cared for the texture or taste. My wife also commented about the texture. She said the taste was strong, but not unpleasant. SO, I’m going to try them again but this time I’m going to do them in a bowl and mash the beans with a fork and then mix everything together. Any thoughts on how to fix the gummy texture? I’m thinking it’s the beans being blended in the food processor.
I’m also going to check out your two other meatball recipes, too.
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Hi Jeff! My meatballs weren’t gummy, so I’m not sure. Maybe you could add more oats, or mash the beans, it could be a good idea. Hope it works!
Adding some chopped walnuts helps with the texture Jeff
I made this last night and they are fab! Really yummy and so easy to make.
Thank you
★★★★★
Hi Helen! So glad you enjoyed them 🙂
Is the flavour of nutritional yeast powerful? I might try this recipe this weekend with pinto beans (got a can to use up) and use 4 tbsp nutritional yeast and 4 tbsp breadcrumbs…
2 more things:
1 – approximately what time and temperature would you do for these meatballs to bake them?
2 – how is your first name pronounced? It looks beautiful!
Hi Hayley! A little bit, but it’s delicious. I would bake them at 350ºF or 180ºC until golden brown 🙂 Thanks a lot, but I don’t know how to explain it if you don’t speak Spanish. It would be something like that: I = E, O = like the O in sOldier, SU = like SUbscribe, NE= like NEt. Have a nice day!
These were fantastic. I made the recipe almost exactly as is but I did use 1/4 cup breadcrumbs & 1/4 cup nutritional yeast instead of the full 1/2 cup. These didn’t even need to be chilled in the fridge – they held together right from processing and packing into balls. I baked them at 350 for 25 minutes total, turning halfway.
★★★★★
So glad you enjoyed them 🙂
I’ve been using a frozen brand of meatballs but I am going to make this recipe. I like the fact that it is made with ingredients that I always have on hand.
I really appreciate the fact that you always include the nutritional information with your recipes. Yours are the consistently easiest, most universally appealing and most delicious vegan recipes on the internet. Thank you so much!
simple, and
Hi Mary! Thank YOU so much for your kind words 🙂 Have a nice day!
Loved this recipe, I have not made anything from your site that I haven’t thoroughly enjoyed! You are so cute too:) Love your videos. Great work!! I would be lost without you:)
Hi Sue! Thanks a lot 🙂 So glad you liked the meatballs. Have a great day!
Isn’t that a bit too much sodium? it’s 50% of the daily recommended value in one serving!
Any substitute for the salt maybe?
Hi Francisco! Just use ingredients with no added salt (beans, marinara sauce and vegetable stock) 🙂
I wish vegetarian and vegan recipes would give the cup measurement for oat flour as well as the oats. I make my own oat flour and don’t like to make more when recipes call for it when I have some in the cupboard. Thanks
Hi Donna! I will include it in the next recipe 🙂 Happy New Year!!!