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Vegan pastitsio with black beans mince!
Delicious, nutritious and vegan!

What generally characterizes the Greek pastitsio, apart from its incredible taste, are the three layers of pasta, mince and béchamel. We follow this basic recipe, making it, not only vegan, but also a lot healthier and nutritious as we use:
1. Black beans and vegetables for the mince
2. Wholemeal flour and olive oil for the béchamel
3. Wholemeal pasta
4. Nutritional yeast enriched with B12 for the béchamel and topping

Our recipe for vegan pastitsio is a real surprise with the mince having a full flavor, the béchamel being rich and fluffy and the topping being incredibly crispy and aromatic.

If you want you can see the recipe for our vegan pastitsio with soy mince and vegetables.Greek vegan pastitsio with béchamel made from almond milk and olive oil

Enjoy! 🙂

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Photo of a piece of pastitso with minced black beans in red sauce and béchamel made of almond milk. A vegan, therefore vegetarian, recipe from All About vegans.

Vegan Greek pastitsio with black beans mince

Recipe for vegan Greek pastitsio. A real surprise with black beans mince, béchamel with almond milk and olive oil, and crispy topping.
5 from 6 votes
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Course: Main Dishes, Main Dish
Cuisine: Greek / Vegan, Greek modern, Greek traditional, Ελληνική / Βίγκαν (vegan), Ελληνική Modern / Vegan
Keywords: B12, almond milk, nutritional yeast, black beans, béchamel, lenten, whole wheat, pastitsio, plant based milk
Prep Time: 50 minutes
Cook Time: 40 minutes
Total Time: 1 hour 30 minutes
Servings: 12 Pieces
Calories: 325kcal
Author: Thodoris Tibilis

Ingredients

Pasta

  • 500  g whole wheat pasta for pastitsio or penne or rigatoni

For vegan mince with black beans in tomato sauce

  • 1 cup raw black beans canned
  • ½ kg tomatoes or 450 g canned
  • 1 onion
  • 2 cloves garlic
  • ½ cup celery (sliced)
  • ½ Florina pepper
  • ¼ cup olive oil
  • 1 Tbsp tomato paste
  • 1 Tbsp cacao powder
  • 1 tsp unprocessed sugar or coconut sugar
  • ½ tsp cinnamon
  • ½ tsp sweet paprika
  • ½ tsp turmeric powder (optional)
  • ¼ tsp dried ground cayenne pepper
  • salt and pepper

For the vegan béchamel

  • 1 liter almond milk or soy or oat
  • 1¼ cup whole wheat flour or all-purpose flour
  • ½ cup olive oil
  • ½ tsp ground nutmeg
  • 3 Tbsp nutritional yeast (preferably with B12) (optional)
  • salt

For vegan topping (optional)

  • 1 large whole wheat rusk or 3 small or 3 toasts
  • 3 Tbsp nutritional yeast preferably with B12 (optional)
  • ¼ tsp ground nutmeg
  • salt

Instructions

Preparation

  • Soak the raw black beans for 8 hours (or 2 in boiling water) and then boil them for 35 minutes or until soft, but not dissolved. If you use canned black beans, skip this step.
  • Bring pasta to a boil and in the meantime finely chop the onion, peppers and garlic, cut the celery into slices and grate or blend the tomatoes.
  • Mash half the beans with a potato press or a fork. Keep the rest of the beans whole.

Vegan soya mince

  • Heat the olive oil in a large pan over medium to high heat and sauté the onion, pepper and celery for 2 minutes. Add the garlic, mix well, add the tomato paste and sauté for another minute.
  • Add the tomato juice, cacao, sugar and spices. Stir well and simmer for 10 minutes. Then add the beans (both mashed and whole ones), simmer for another 5 minutes and remove the pan from the heat.

Vegan béchamel

  • Heat the olive oil in a non-stick pot, over medium to high heat.
  • Slowly add all the flour, stirring constantly.
  • Once the flour is lightly cooked (it gets a slightly darker color and starts to smell, in about 5 minutes), add the almond milk, nutmeg and salt and mix for another 7 minutes or until it thickens a bit and becomes like a liquid cream. Once it's ready, add the nutritional yeast and stir.

Vegan pastitsio

  • Grease a medium baking pan (approximately 37x30x5 cm) and put in layers, the pasta on the bottom (sprinkled with a little olive oil and nutmeg), next the mince, then the béchamel and finally, optionally, sprinkle with the topping.
  • Bake in a preheated oven at 200°C/392°F for 40 minutes or until the béchamel gets a nice golden brown color.

Vegan topping

  • Crush all the ingredients for the topping in the mortar (or lightly in the blender). Don't crush it too much, as we need some larger pieces of rusk or toast to make it crispy.

Notes

To save time:
  1. At the same time warm water in two pots. One for the beans and one for the pasta. With a kettle you can accelerate the process even more.
  2. While the beans are boiling, prepare the vegetables for the mince and the topping.
  3. Heat the olive oil in the pan, two minutes before you finish preparing the vegetables.
  4. While the minced meat is boiling, prepare the béchamel.
  5. Preheat the oven when starting the béchamel. That wayi t will be hot when the béchamel is ready and you will cook your vegan pastitsio immediately.
Instead of almond milk you can use soy milk. That way you will have a fluffier béchamel.
Our pasta :
  • You can boil them in vegetable broth for extra flavor and nutrients.
  • You can boil them in water adding ½ tsp turmeric and 2 bay leaves. Thus, the pasta will have a light aroma and at the same time you take advantage of the anti-inflammatory and antioxidant action of turmeric.
  • When you add put them in the baking pan, you can mix with 4 Tbsp from your mince, olive oil, salt, pepper, nutmeg and nutritional yeast for extra flavor.
The vegan topping is optional. We recommend it as it creates a wonderful and crunchy crust with rich flavor, but also offers us the opportunity to enrich our vegan pastitsio with B12. Alternatively, you can use:
  • Crushed nuts.
  • Vegan topping from cashews. Blend ½ cup of cashews, 2 Tbsp nutritional yeast, salt and pepper and from ¼ Tbsp onion powder, garlic powder and sweet paprika.

Nutrition

Calories: 325kcal | Carbohydrates: 47g | Protein: 13g | Fat: 11g | Saturated Fat: 2g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 2g | Monounsaturated Fat: 7g | Sodium: 130mg | Potassium: 565mg | Fiber: 5g | Sugar: 3g | Vitamin A: 603IU | Vitamin C: 13mg | Calcium: 148mg | Iron: 3mg

The nutrition chart does not show B12, the content of which will depend on the nutritional yeast you use.

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