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    Home » Recipes » Sides & Appetizers

    Published: Sep 7, 2017 · Modified: Feb 4, 2021 by Melanie McDonald · This post contains affiliate links · As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. · 67 Comments

    Healthy No Oil Crispy Roasted Potatoes

    GO TO RECIPE GO TO VIDEO PRINT RECIPE
    4.57 from 30 votes
    Golden Crispy Roasted Potatoes without a single drop of oil. Easy, healthy, low calorie and virtually fat-free! 

    Golden Crispy Roasted Potatoes without a single drop of oil. Easy, healthy, low calorie and virtually fat-free! 

    Crispy Roasted Potatoes in terracotta bowl

    It's all about the simple things in life today. Like potatoes ❤️ I adore them. Nothing beats Crispy Roasted Potatoes to serve alongside your vegan beef, vegan turkey style roast and maybe some roasted red cabbage too. But, with all that lovely yummy crispiness comes oil and fat and grease.

    Until now.....

    Since the creation of my completely oil-free Loaded Taco Fries, I have been wanting to experiment a little more with using aquafaba as a substitute for oil when roasting.

    Well I finally got around to it and these Healthy No Oil Crispy Roasted Potatoes happened.

    Jump to:
    • Healthy roasted potatoes
    • Ingredients
    • What is aquafaba?
    • How to make oil-free roasted potatoes
    • Hungry for more?
    • 📖 Recipe
    • Comments

    Healthy roasted potatoes

    I love traditionally cooked roast potatoes a lot and I am not going to lie, these don't taste quite as good as those. After all, as unhealthy as using copious amounts of oil is, it tastes pretty good when roasted up with the humble spud. However, these healthy oil-free roasted potatoes with aquafaba are a pretty close runner up, and what you lose (just) a little bit in taste, you make up for in low calories, virtually non existent fat content and smug, feel good healthiness.

    Plus if you are anything like me, you can put those calories you saved on the potatoes to good use when it comes to dessert.

    And your oven will thank you muchly too! Oily things splatter EVERYWHERE and I'm sure you are all aware of how thoroughly awful cleaning ovens is. I literally have to not show mine ever in my recipe videos because I hate cleaning it and if you so much as caught a glimpse I might die of embarrassment.

    Healthy No Oil Crispy Roasted Potatoes - close up shot

    Ingredients

    These Healthy No Oil Crispy Roasted Potatoes are super simple to make. All you need is a rimmed baking tray or roasting pan and just 3 ingredients plus some some salt and pepper.

    The ingredients are:

    • Potatoes (obvi!)
    • Semolina (or cornmeal)
    • Aquafaba a.k.a magic bean juice

    What is aquafaba?

    Aquafaba is the liquid that is in a can of chickpeas. When you use chickpeas save it to use in all kinds of recipes such as these oil-free roasted potatoes and vegan baking. It freezes well so if you open a can and have no need for the aquafaba save it for a later date.

    How to make oil-free roasted potatoes

    It's such an easy process too. Check out my video to see exactly how, but basically, you boil the potatoes for a bit, drain and allow to steam dry, Then drizzle over aquafaba and sprinkle on semolina. Shake well to rough 'em up, then roast. Flip, roast some more, then EAT!

    The roughing up is an essential part of the process. It creates a thick slurry of aquafaba, soft potato and semolina which coats and clings and crisps up beautifully. It also makes them turn gloriously golden as all perfect roast potatoes should be!

    Hungry for more?

    If you love potatoes then you might also enjoy my Lemon Garlic Air Fryer Roasted Potatoes,  Vegan Potato Soup, Green Bean Potato Curry and my Melting Cinnamon Roasted Sweet Potatoes.

    📖 Recipe

    crispy roasted potatoes

    Healthy No Oil Crispy Roasted Potatoes

    Author: Melanie McDonald
    4.57 from 30 votes
    Golden Crispy Roasted Potatoes without a single drop of oil. Easy, healthy, low calorie and virtually fat-free! 
    Print Recipe Pin Recipe SaveSaved!
    PREP TIME: 15 minutes
    COOK TIME: 45 minutes
    TOTAL TIME: 1 hour
    Servings: 4

    Ingredients
      

    • 900g / 2 lbs potatoes , see notes
    • 80mls / ⅓ cup aquafaba , the liquid from a can of chickpeas (or use 4 tablespoons of oil instead)
    • 3 tablespoons semolina , cornmeal can also be used but make sure it isn't too course. Semolina is not gluten-free so be sure to use the cornmeal option if you need to keep this recipe gluten-free
    • Salt
    • Pepper
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    INSTRUCTIONS
     

    • Preheat oven to 450°F
    • Peel the potatoes and cut into chunks. Timings here are based on a medium potato being cut into about 5 pieces. Make sure all pieces are pretty even.
    • Place the potatoes in a pan, cover with water and bring to a boil. Once boiling they should take about 5 - 6 minutes to become just fork tender. As soon as they do, drain through a colander then leave for a few minutes to steam dry before returning to the saucepan. 
    • Line a baking tray or roaster with parchment paper or a Silpat. This is essential because no oil is used. 
    • Add the aquafaba and semolina to the potatoes, put the lid on the saucepan and shake vigorously a good few times to rough up the potatoes, then dig in with a spoon and stir them around a bit to get the potatoes slurry that has settled on the bottom to coat them thoroughly. 
    • Tip the potatoes onto the lined tray and spread them out so they are not touching each other then season with a generous amount of salt and freshly ground pepper. 
    • Place in the hot oven and cook for 25 minutes. Remove, flip them all over then return to the oven and cook for around another 20 minutes or until a lovely golden brown. The time will vary a little depending on your oven and the type of pan you are cooking them in.  
    • Serve immediately.

    NOTES

    Using the right kind of potato is really important when it comes to great roast potatoes. A high starch content is necessary to get a lovely fluffy inside and a crusty exterior. Russet potatoes are ideal or Maris Piper in the UK. And even though they aren't really classed as a high starch potato, Yukon Gold work well too. 
     

    NUTRITION

    Serving: 1servingCalories: 185kcalCarbohydrates: 42gProtein: 5gFat: 0.3gSodium: 37mgFiber: 6gSugar: 2gVitamin C: 28.1mgCalcium: 20mgIron: 1.4mg

    Nutritional information is provided for convenience & as a courtesy. The data is a computer generated estimate so should be used as a guide only.

    Tried this recipe?Rate it & leave your feedback in the comments section below, or tag @avirtualvegan on Instagram and hashtag it #avirtualvegan
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    Reader Interactions

    Comments

    1. Bev says

      December 22, 2020 at 3:29 pm

      5 stars
      Fantastic! My family loved these! Switching to an oil free diet. Didn’t miss the oil one bit. Followed the recipe exactly. Thank you so much!

      Reply
    2. Elon says

      September 07, 2020 at 4:45 pm

      5 stars
      I'm eating these right now and they are very crispy and tasty! Thanks for the recipe!

      Reply
      • A Virtual Vegan says

        September 07, 2020 at 6:15 pm

        So pleased you're enjoying them!

        Reply
    3. Lee says

      June 06, 2020 at 4:04 pm

      Will this recipe work with masa (ground corn flour) instead of corn meal?

      Reply
      • A Virtual Vegan says

        June 08, 2020 at 10:44 am

        I think that would be fine.

        Reply
      • Penny says

        April 06, 2021 at 3:03 pm

        5 stars
        I didn't have corn meal, corn flour or semolina, so I used gluten-free Tapioca starch, and they turned out great anyway.!

        Reply
    4. Karen says

      May 20, 2020 at 1:28 am

      5 stars
      OMG tried these tonight they are amazeballs. Thanks for sharing

      Reply
    5. Elizabeth says

      May 19, 2020 at 2:45 pm

      Sorry, I do see where you state to return potatoes to pan. Is it a saucepan with lid? Thanks

      Reply
      • A Virtual Vegan says

        May 19, 2020 at 3:37 pm

        Once drained and steamed dry, you return them to the pan you boiled them in so you can toss them with the other ingredients before spreading out on a baking tray. Hope that helps!

        Reply
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    Melanie McDonald

    I'm Melanie McDonald (but you can call me Mel), best-selling cookbook author and creator of A Virtual Vegan. I share well-tested, flavour-packed vegan recipes with clear, step-by-step instructions. My goal is to give you the confidence to cook amazing vegan food from scratch.

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