Spicy Beef-Style Walnut Meat

Name: Spicy Beef-Style Walnut Meat
Prep time: 10 min
Total time: 10 min
Ingredients: 2 cups raw California walnuts (soaked in cool water 20 minutes); 2 cloves garlic (minced); 1/4 cup minced yellow onion; 1/4 cup soy sauce; 2 Tbsp olive oil (optional*); 2 Tbsp nutritional yeast; 1 Tbsp dried oregano (or 2 Tbsp fresh minced oregano); 2 tsp ground cumin; 1 tsp cayenne pepper**

ByBrittany Roche August 17, 2021March 11, 2025

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This spicy beef-style walnut meat is our go-to plant-based meat recipe for vegan tacos, nachos, crunch wraps, and beyond! Walnut beef is easy to make with only 9 staple ingredients, 3 simple steps, and 5 minutes of active time. The spicy savory flavor will make you fall in love with walnuts forever. Thank you to our friends at California Walnuts for sponsoring this blog post!

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It’s no secret how deep my love for walnut meat runs. In fact, as far as plant-based ground meats go, I’d venture to say walnut meat is my all-time favorite.

But this does strike me as a bit odd because, while walnut meat is AWESOME, the texture is different and less tender than a seitan or soy-based version.

There’s just something about walnut meat that has my heart. Maybe it’s that it’s wildly easy to make and therefore, always there for me when a last-minute taco craving hits. Or perhaps the depth and richness of its amazing flavor has me mesmerized.

It could also partially be that I love the way “walnut meat” sounds. Walnut meat, Walnut meat. WALNUT MEAT! That phrase just sounds so perfectly badass and also kinda fancy at the same time. I love it.

Whatever the reason, I highly suggest you give the whole walnut meat thing a try!

Ingredients in walnut taco meat: raw soaked walnuts, nutritional yeast, cayenne pepper, oregano, cumin, minced onion, minced garlic, soy sauce, olive oil.

Ingredients in Walnut Beef

A while back, we shared a recipe for sausage-style walnut meat, but the one we’re sharing today is a spicy beef-style walnut meat we love on everything from pastas and salads to tacos and even casseroles in the winter.

It’s flavored with basic kitchen staple ingredients like soy sauce, fresh garlic and onion, optional olive oil, nutritional yeast, ground cumin, and cayenne pepper (for a pinch of heat!)

Process shots of how to make walnut meat. The photo on the left shows the walnuts, onions, garlic, and remainder of ingredients in a food processor before blending. The photo on the right shows the walnut meat after you pulse all the ingredients together.

How to Make Walnut Taco Meat

You’ll start with some fresh California walnuts! And pro tip: Make sure you’re storing your walnuts in the fridge (or the freezer if you’re like us and buy in bulk!). Fresh California walnuts are the KEY ingredient in this walnut meat recipe, so treat them accordingly!

Once you’ve soaked the walnuts (20 minutes in cool water, NBD), this walnut beef recipe takes about 5 minutes to throw together.

All you have to do is drain the soaked walnuts and add them to your food processor (use one with a pulse function!) along with the rest of the flavoring ingredients.

From there, you just pulse the mixture about 7-9 times until it looks like a nice ground meat texture (think tacos) and all the ingredients are well-combined.

That’s it – that’s how you make walnut meat! Easy, right?

A head-on shot of spicy beef-style walnut meat in a green and brown striped bowl. A ramekin of raw walnuts is in the background.

How to Use Beef-Style Walnut Meat

This easy beef-style walnut meat recipe is awesome for meal prep because there’s a million different ways you can use it throughout the week to spice up your everyday meals like:

Salads – I make a “nacho salad” with this walnut beef and our vegan queso. Or, skip the salad part and make a big pile of vegan nachos!
Casseroles – Like our Spicy Vegan Tater Tot Hotdish. Match made in heaven!
Lasagna – This spicy walnut meat would make an incredible meat-free take on classic lasagna or even ravioli.
And of course, taco night! Or take it a step farther with a Vegan Crunchwrap.

How to Store Leftover Walnut Meat

Fridge: You can store leftover walnut beef in an air-tight container in the fridge for up to 1 week.

Freezer: This recipe makes quite a lot of walnut meat (maybe 1 ½ cups), but leftovers freeze so well. We suggest freezing walnut meat on a baking sheet overnight. Then, you can transfer it to a freezer-safe bag or container and freeze for at least 6 weeks. Freezing the walnut meat on a baking sheet first will allow it to maintain an element of crumbliness and prevent it from freezing in one big block.

A close-up photo of vegan walnut taco meat in a green and brown striped bowl. There is a single dried red chili on top along with a sprig of oregano. A ramekin of raw walnuts is in the background.

More Walnut Meat Recipes:

Sausage-Style Walnut Meat
Vegan Walnut Chorizo
Walnut-Based Vegan Scrapple
Can’t get enough walnut meat? Check out our walnut meat guide for tips, more recipes, and ways to customize it!

When you try this beef-style walnut meat magic, let us know how it goes and how you used it!

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We hope you have fun with this recipe, friends. Until next time!