Creamy Vegan Mac&Cheese

I learned that in early high school years that my body could no longer tolerate dairy. Since then, it’s been years of experimenting with dairy free options. Luckily, there are sooo many dairy free options now, that I am usually able to find something I like. But I’ll admit, there are still many dairy-free alternatives that I just feel are no where close to the real thing. Mac&Cheese was one of those meals. I tried so many recipes, and just never felt like it satisfied the craving. It doesn’t help that I am not a big fan of the flavor of nutritional yeast, which is a vegan alternative for cheesy flavor.

Finally, the experimenting paid off and I have a recipe that really gave the perfect mac&cheese texture. I learned that adding in potatoes and cashews helped give it the creamy texture I was looking for, while carrots and tomatoes gave it that great cheese color. Have I found complete perfection? Not yet. But for now, I want to share this delicious recipe with all of you and will tweak it as I learn more about vegan cooking and flavors!

Creamy Vegan Mac&Cheese

Recipe by Simply Balanced MealsCourse: Dinner, LunchDifficulty: Easy

Servings

6

servings

Prep time

10

minutes

Cooking time

25

minutes

Deliciously, creamy vegan mac&cheese with hidden veggies!

Ingredients

• 1 cup veggie broth

• 1 1/4 cup water

• 1 medium russet potato, chopped

• 1/3 cup chopped carrots

• 1 medium tomato, chopped

• 2 T raw cashews

• 1 tsp mustard

• 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce (optional)

• 1 ½ tsp soy sauce or coconut aminos

• 2 T nutritional yeast*

• 1 tsp garlic powder

• 1 tsp onion powder

• 12 oz elbow pasta*

• 3/4 cup broccoli florets, small (optional)

Directions

• Bring a large pot of water to boil. Cook pasta according to box (if adding broccoli, add them in the last 3-4 minutes). Drain and set aside.
• While your pasta is cooking, use a large skillet or wok to make sauce. Add broth, water, potato, carrots, cashews and tomato to pan. Bring to boil, cover and cook for 15-18 minutes, or until potato is fork tender.
• Add potato mixure to a blender (or use an immersion blender). Add in the rest of the sauce ingredients. Blend until smooth.
• Pour sauce back into pan or the pasta pot, add in pasta/broccoli and mix together. You may need to heat on stove for a few minutes to heat the noodles back up. Enjoy!

Notes

• I am not a huge fan of nutritional yeast…at least not in large doses. So, I only added 2 T but feel free to add 3 or 4 if you’re a fan of the flavor! You could also use 1/4 cup df shredded cheese, but I haven’t experimented with that yet!
• To make gluten free, just sub gluten free pasta! And make sure to use coconut aminos instead of the soy sauce
• Store in air tight container in fridge for up to 4-5 days