Recipe for vegan Mini Calzones filled with spinach, mushrooms, tomato sauce & homemade vegan cheese. They are perfect little finger foods for parties!
Calzone Party!! Oh man… have I ever mentioned how much I love those little pockets filled with steaming hot deliciousness? My boyfriend loves those as well and he demands them on a regular basis and that’s absolutely okay with me because they are one of the most awesome things one can make in the kitchen.
They are also great for parties because people can eat them without a knife and fork and you can dip them in tomato sauce. If you want more party ideas, make sure you check out my collection of 12 vegan drinks & eats for your next party.
How to make vegan Mini Calzones from scratch
This is how the dough should look like. I’ve let my bread machine knead the dough, but you can use a kitchen machine as well or knead it by hand, afterward let the dough rise until it doubles in size.
Cut the dough in 8 equal pieces. Of course, you can make 2 bigger calzones instead or smaller ones.
Make cute little balls so they are easier to roll out into an evenly round shape.
Roll the pieces in mini pizza bases! Use a floured surface.
Top the pizza bases on one half with tomato sauce, the filling and the nooch cheese sauce and fold it. Press the edges down. Fold them again and press them down again to make a pretty crust!
Brush them with oil. I’ve used a herb oil, but you can use olive oil, garlic oil or anything you prefer and have at home.
I’ve doubled the measurements for the tomato sauce to have something to dip the vegan Mini Calzones in afterwards. Totally worth it!
Mini Calzone dipped in a smoky tomato sauce – Yumm! But be careful, the calzones are super hot!
Mini Calzones
Ingredients
Ingredients for the dough
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon olive oil
- 1/2 teaspoon instant yeast
- 1 cup warm water
Ingredients for the filling
- 2 cups mushrooms
- 2-3 cups fresh spinach
- Homemade Nooch Cheese (or sub with your favorite vegan cheese shreds)
- 1 1/2 cups tomato purée* (if you don't want tomato sauce to dip the Calzones in afterwards, half the amount of tomato purée!)
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- ground pepper
- 1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1/4 teaspoon liquid smoke
- a few twigs fresh oregano
- olive oil for brushing the top
Instructions
- For the dough put all ingredients in a kitchen machine or mix by hand and let it rise until it doubles in size, but keep it covered under a clean kitchen towel otherwise the dough will dry out.
- Prepare the Nooch Cheese Sauce.
- Preheat the oven as hot at 480°F/250°C.
- Cut the dough in 8 equal pieces and roll them out on a floured surface.
- Clean the mushrooms and spinach, cut the mushrooms in thin slices and put the mushrooms in a hot pan (You want the mushrooms to lose most of their water now, they shouldn't water up the calzone later). Add the spinach to let it cook down.
- For the tomato sauce mix the tomato purée with the salt, ground pepper, fresh oregano, onion powder and liquid smoke. (Adjust the sauce to your taste)
- Spread the tomato sauce over half of the calzone pizzas, add the mushroom-spinach mixture and add the vegan cheese sauce.
- Fold the calzone and press it down on the edges. Fold the edges again and a third time to make it pretty! Repeat until all calzones are fold.
- Brush the calzones with a bit of olive oil and bake them in the oven for about 20-30 minutes. Enjoy!
Notes
*I used store-bought tomato purée (with salt, no additional herbs) for this recipe - it's often canned or in cartons, not to confuse with tomato paste which is thicker in consistency.
emnaomi
These look so good! I need to try them, I haven’t had a vegan calzone before.
Bianca
yeay – I can totally recommend it! We have them on a regular basis on our meal plan because they’re simply too delicious not to make them :)
Strength and Sunshine
O totally remember eating these back in the day before GF and vegan! So good and must dip in some good tomato sauce!
Sandra Vungi
These look wonderful, Bianca!!
Natalie
Calzones or hot pockets were one of my favorite every once in a while meal growing up! My sister and I used to beg my mom to make them all the time too. I’m so happy to see them transformed into a vegan and so much healthier version :) I would love to throw some broccoli in there too!
Bianca
Broccoli sounds like a wonderful idea! I had an amazing broccoli pizza a few weeks ago with cashew cheese and a homemade spelt-base. So yummy! It was my first time having broccoli on pizza, but definitely not the last :)
winwinfood
These are super cute Bianca! I bet they make the perfect party food :) Totally work the extra effort in the kitchen.
Bianca
Thanks Lucie! Anything that allows dipping is the perfect partyfood, right? :) Making everything from scratch is so.. satisfying but of course, if one doesn’t want to commit to making the pizza dough at home, there are a ton of store-bought options.
winwinfood
Absolutely! Right, store-bought pizza dough sounds like a good time saver.
Sina @ Vegan Heaven
Oh wow! I absolutely can’t wait to make these! They look so delicious and cute, Bianca! :-)
Audrey @ Unconventional Baker
Oh, these look pretty awesome, Bianca! I love all your savory comfort foods <3
Bianca
Aww thank you Audrey! Yeah I think pretty much every dish I make is comfort food :D
Where you get your protein!
These look so good! I must try them, I think they will be a hit with my daughter!
Bianca
Thank you so much! Yeah – they’re super kid-friendly :)
ibdeets
These look amazing, can’t wait to make them. One quick question. For nooch sauce i don’t see any nooch listed as an ingredient. Is this correct? Thanks for sharing.
Bianca
Nutritional Yeast Flakes are called Nooch :) I hope that clears things up!
Liz Martone
I can’t get over how adorable these are!! They actually look pretty simple to make too—- definitely pinning!!
Bianca
Thank you so much for kind words and also for pinning ^.^ I love how versatile they are and the calzones are always a great hit on parties too :)
Mina
I can’t seem to find what you heat the oven to? Going to try these tonight!
Bianca
Hi Mina, it’s in step 3. I always heat the oven as a hot as possible, so 480°F / 250°C :)
Let me know how they turn out for you!
Tiffany Richard
These look delicious I’m gonna make them next week. ????
Bianca
Awesome! Let me know how they turn out for you :)
myeverydayveganlife
I made these tonight for dinner. My boyfriend and I loved them. They were very easy to make. The dough tasted just like pizza dough. I’m going to use it to make a pizza. Also love the mooch sauce. Anytime I can find a recipe for cheese sauce that doesn’t require me to soak cashews over night is a good thing. I was wondering how long would these keep in the refrigerator and could they be frozen. Great recipe!!!
Bianca
Thanks for the feedback! I’m glad you and your boyfriend liked them! The dough for the calzones is my regular pizza dough – I love having multifunctional simple doughs :) Great to hear that you loved the nooch sauce! The cheese sauce is really good on pizza, lasagne (YUMM!) or as a mac & cheese sauce, too. I’d say the calzones keep in the fridge for about 2 days… I haven’t tried freezing them yet but one of my readers did and she said it worked well and they still tasted great :)
Cecilia Derry
I absolutely loved these! They were a last resort for something to eat and they honestly did not take that long to make. So very delicious, thanks so much for the recipe!
Bianca
I’m so glad you liked them, Cecilia!
Liz L.
I made this for my teenager girls this morning and they LOVE IT!!!! I added vegan mozzarella cheese but forgot to add Nooch in my recipe. I only made 4 and saved the other dough for next time. I baked it for 25 mins at 400 degrees.
Bianca
Yeay, so glad your girls loved them, Liz! :) Mhhh, vegan mozzarella cheese sounds delicious!
Michelle
Hi have you tried making gluten free dough? I’d love to make these for a party, but need gf dough. Thank you,
Bianca
I haven’t tried that yet. Sorry!
Bea
This is sooo good! And surprisingly simple. My family devoured them in one night so I made it again!!!! Thanks for sharing!
Allison
I’ve made this dough 2x now, and both times it was so separated and didn’t rise or become pliable. I’m not sure what I could have done wrong. Used 2 different yeast packets. Tried adding a bit more moisture too. Scratching my head… But your recipe encouraged me to try my hand at calzones during this quarantine, and they were a bit regardless, so I persist! :)
Allison
I meant, “they were a HIT”