Vegan Summer Rolls Recipe | Fresh & Full of Vegetables

Recipe Note

This summer roll recipe is vegan, delicious, and also looks impressive – surprise your loved ones with fresh summer rolls. They will surely be delighted!

Summer roll sauce

You definitely need a tasty sauce for summer rolls. Many people's favorite: peanut sauce. An Asian-inspired peanut sauce makes the summer rolls even more intense in flavor and irresistibly delicious! That’s why we also included a peanut sauce in our vegan summer roll recipe.
Our sauce is super quick and easy to mix, and you only need a handful of ingredients. The most important: a good peanut cream that is intense in flavor and pleasantly creamy.
Dip your summer rolls into the sauce or even put some sauce directly inside the roll for an extra creamy experience.

Here are more delicious sauce ideas for you – feel free to combine several sauces and create a whole dip buffet:

• Sesame: tahini, lime juice, soy sauce, water

• Spicy pineapple: finely chopped pineapple, coriander, lime juice, chili

• Hoisin: hoisin sauce, garlic, lime juice

• Spicy mango: pureed mango, lime juice, chili, soy sauce

• Ginger: soy sauce, ginger, garlic oil, rice vinegar

No matter which dip you ultimately choose, all go well with our summer roll recipe (vegan).

Perfect for groups | the best summer roll ingredients

The great thing about summer rolls is that you are completely free in how you want to fill, dip, and serve them:

• Our summer roll recipe is vegan, so our summer rolls are with tofu or simply just summer rolls with vegetables. But you can also make the summer rolls vegetarian or offer an animal protein source for meat eaters.

• Summer roll dip: Summer rolls with peanut sauce are very popular, but you can also make many other dips, like a sesame dip, a garlic sauce, or a vegan yogurt dip. Your creativity knows no bounds.

• Important info for people with celiac disease: Both rice paper and glass noodles are gluten-free – mostly anyway. But still watch out for possible cross-contamination and the information on the packaging.

• No complicated ingredients: Unlike other recipes where you absolutely need the listed ingredients, this vegan summer roll recipe gives you a lot of freedom – you definitely need the rice paper, otherwise it gets tricky. For all other ingredients, we offer alternatives in our substitution table, such as lemon juice as a rice vinegar alternative.

My tip: Summer rolls are also a great idea for a social evening – everyone can assemble their own rolls at the table. This way, everyone can decide what goes into their roll – perfect also for children or diverse groups where everyone likes something different. Have the vegan summer roll recipe ready at hand, I’m sure you’ll be asked for it often! ;)

What goes in summer rolls?

When making summer rolls for the first time, you often wonder what to fill the small rice paper rolls with. Don’t worry, we have many delicious ideas for your summer roll filling. Of course, you can also deviate from our vegan summer roll recipe!

Summer roll filling – ideas:

Vegetables & fruit:

• crunchy vegetables like carrot, cucumber, bell pepper, radish, kohlrabi, spring onions

• fresh fruit like mango, pineapple, or pomegranate seeds

• Herbs and salads like mint, arugula, coriander, Thai basil

• special ingredients like avocado or sprouts

Proteins:

• (Smoked) tofu

• Seitan

• Legumes like lentils or chickpeas

• Tempeh

Very important: Remember to season your protein source, otherwise it can quickly taste bland. Mix a tasty curry sauce or peanut marinade, sear the protein sources, or use already smoked products like smoked tofu. This way, you get a lot of flavor in your summer rolls.

Crunch:

• chopped peanuts

• Sesame

Other:

• Rice noodles

• Kimchi

• Hummus

Do you have any other rice paper filling ideas that would make our vegan summer roll recipe even better? Then feel free to let us know! :)

Make summer rolls yourself | Vegan summer roll recipe

Although Vetains' vegan summer roll recipe is actually simple, you quickly encounter a challenge: How do you fold the rolls so they hold together well and avoid rice paper chaos?

Here is a step-by-step guide:

1. Good preparation is everything! You need a somewhat deep plate filled with lukewarm water. You also need a suitable surface where your summer rolls won’t stick later: either a (moistened) wooden board or a damp kitchen towel. You need one surface for folding the summer rolls and another to store the finished rolls.

2. Dip a rice paper sheet into water for a few seconds (about 5 seconds). If you leave it in too short or too long, shaping will be harder. But don’t worry, after a few tries you’ll get the hang of it.

3. Place the damp rice paper on your work surface.

4. Now it’s time to fill: Place your vegetables and other ingredients slightly below the center, centrally on the rice paper. Stack everything on top of each other—don’t spread it too much on the paper.

5. Attention: Don’t overfill, or the rice paper will tear later. ;) But I’d be lying if I said that never happened to me. Again: practice makes perfect.

6. Now fold the left and right sides of the rice paper inward, over your filling.

7. Fold the bottom side over your filling.

8. Now grab the forming roll and roll it quite tightly with the remaining paper.

Tips:

• If your rice paper is very sticky, that’s a sign you soaked it in the water for too long.

• If your rice paper breaks while rolling, you should dip it in the water a little longer.

• Cover your finished spring rolls with a damp kitchen towel to keep the summer rolls fresh until you serve them.

This is how the vegan summer rolls recipe will definitely succeed!

Substitution table

How often do we want to cook a recipe but are missing certain ingredients or don’t like some components? For this case, we have a substitution table for you so you can adjust the vegan summer rolls recipe as you like! Simply swap individual ingredients as you wish!

• Smoked tofu → other types of tofu (preferably marinated and fried), seitan, legumes in a tasty marinade

• Rice noodles → other noodles or omit

• Vegetables → You are completely free to choose your vegetables! Just take whatever you like.

• Peanut butter → Almond butter or Hazelnut butter

• Soy sauce → water with salt

• Lime juice → lemon juice

• Garlic clove → omit

• Rice vinegar → lime or lemon juice

• Ginger → omit

• Chili → omit or cayenne pepper

Our summer rolls are vegan, but of course, you can use animal ingredients if you want!

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