One of the things that has surprised me the most with vegan cuisine is how I’m able to create similar flavours and textures that I used to enjoy while eating animal products. The goal, for me, is not to aim for the vegan dish to taste exactly the same, but to try to bring out something about the non-vegan dish that I really enjoyed, like a rich sauce or a thick chocolaty pudding. This doesn’t apply to all foods however, I have no desire to create a dish that has the texture of meat because I just don’t crave that texture or taste anymore. It really just depends on the food!
[Butternut Squash Mac n Cheeze: Two Ways]
One of the things I’ve always loved about Mac ‘n Cheese is that it’s comforting and creamy. When I make a vegan version of Mac ‘n Cheese, I’m not trying to create a carbon copy, but a dish that gives me that same type of comforting feeling when I eat it.
Over the past couple years, I’ve found that I can create dishes that satisfy my cravings without having to sacrifice. I crave the new dishes that I make, instead of the dishes I used to eat. Now that I’m used to this lifestyle I rarely feel like I’m missing out. The only time I feel left out is when I am eating at a non-vegan friendly restaurant, otherwise I have so many choices the hardest part is trying to decide what I will eat!
One thing I don’t always enjoy about vegan cooking and baking is the often long ingredient list that is required to make some recipes. The recipes tend to involve more creativity, more spices & seasonings, and other ingredients to achieve that outcome that I’m looking for. It’s not necessarily a bad thing per say, but sometimes I just want a quick and dirty recipe that I know I can whip up within a minute’s notice.
This 5-ingredient cheeze sauce is one of those quick and dirty recipes that I know I will keep coming back to again and again! It’s hands down the easiest cheeze sauce I’ve made and it doesn’t require a food processor or other special kitchen tool. Just a stove top and a whisk…gotta love that!
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Low-Fat Vegan Cheeze Sauce
Yield
2/3 cup
Prep time
Cook time
Total time
This is the Lexus of all the cheeze sauces I’ve made to date. It’s extremely smooth, buttery, and comforting!
Ingredients
- 3/4 cup unsweetened, unflavoured almond milk (or more as needed to thin out)
- 6 tbsp nutritional yeast (Bob’s Red Mill makes one in natural food section of most grocery stores or bulk food stores)
- 1 tbsp Earth Balance or other non-dairy buttery spread
- 1 tbsp all purpose flour (or other flour)
- 2 tsp Dijon mustard
- 1/4 tsp garlic powder
- 1/4 tsp onion powder
- 1/2 tsp kosher salt & freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Directions
- In a skillet or pot, melt the Earth Balance over medium heat.
- In a medium sized bowl, whisk together the flour and milk until all clumps are gone.
- Add milk & flour mixture and nutritional yeast to pot and whisk well. Reduce heat to low-medium.
- Add Dijon, garlic powder, onion powder, salt and pepper to taste and whisk frequently until the sauce thickens up, for about 5 minutes. If it’s still too thin you can add more flour to achieve the thickness you desire. To reheat: reheat in the microwave or on the stove-top (add a splash of milk if it’s too thick) and whisk well. Store in an air-tight container for up to 5-7 days.
Just 5 ingredients and just as delicious as the other sauces I’ve made!
I first made this sauce a couple weeks ago and we’ve been enjoying it a lot! I’ve poured it into pasta, on vegetables, sandwiches, etc. It’s so silky and delicious, you really have to try this. You could also get creative and add some herbs or spices to it to change it up quite easily.
Yesterday, I also made a fantastic lunch with it…
more on that recipe tomorrow!
The Quick & Dirty 7-Ingredient or Less Challenge
Speaking of short ingredient lists, I thought it would be fun to challenge myself to create more vegan recipes with as few ingredients as possible. Quick & Dirty recipes if you will!
My goal is to create more recipes with 7 ingredients or less that don’t require a lot of time or even special kitchen tools. It’s going to be tough, but I’m really excited for the challenge!
I’m curious, what’s your biggest cooking or baking hurdle? Long ingredient lists, hard to find ingredients, special kitchen tools, not enough time?
Leave me a comment below if you have any recipes in mind that you’d like ‘condensed’…no pun intended!
i cannot stand a long ingredient list and detailed directions. the words start swimming on the page. i figure if i can’t make the recipe while i am enjoying an evening with my husband with a glass of wine in hand-forget it!
love the cheeze sauce!
This is definitely easy enough to make on any night! And the biggest recipe hurdle I face is seeing a long list of ingredients that I don’t have in the pantry. Who wants to spend that extra money on things they may never use again??
You gotta love a good cheese or “cheeze” sauce and I love that everytime I make one of your sauces, my kids love them too. Looking forward to making this one!
My nephew has very bad food allergies and cannot have any dairy. This looks so good, I’m going to try making it for him this weekend. Thanks for the idea!!
“Quick and Ddirty” made me giggle. :) I will have to try this. I’ve been mixing hummus and apple cider vinegar since reading your post on that and I am LOVING it.
My biggest hurdle is more about time. I work a lot of hours and sometimes I succumb to “grab and go” options. I actually don’t mind longer ingredient lists, especially when they involve fun spices.
Quick and dirty recipes are always my favorites – who has time to slave away for hours on a daily basis? Cheese sauces have been one of my favorite vegan things to make – that comforting factor is so irreplaceable!
I love this recipe for all of the reasons you gave! I am going to try this out for sure. My biggest baking hurdle is having too many baked goods already in the fridge and freezer so I can’t make more
I would say my biggest hurdle is overly complicated recipes – like pitting 30 olives for example. No thanks! Also, recipes that get too many kitchen appliances dirty.
I love the simplicity of this! I don’t really have many cooking hurdles and actually really enjoy it, but I’d say the biggest one for me is probably just finding time to prep the recipes I want to try. For example, a lot of the raw recipes I’m lusting over involve soaking things for hours or overnight, so you really have to plan ahead. Your pizza looks SO good!
yea those can get me too…esp. when I come across a raw recipe and want to make it *now* but then I have to wait overnight. I think that’s also why I never got into my dehydrator.
Dad gummit, woman – that looks good!
Wow, that looks delicious and SO easy to make! Simple recipes are so refreshing, especially when the few ingredients are common ones – I have all of these items on hand. What’s more, most of the “cheeze” recipes I see call for blended cashews, which are delicious but expensive just to blend into a simple sauce. Definitely trying this recipe soon – easy and affordable! Thanks!
I love cheese sauce, that looks amazing! Looking forward to the pizza recipe too :)
I don’t have a food processor and so many recipes require one. Also because I’m in Ireland I can’t always get my hands on certain ingredients – chia seeds, nutritional yeast and sunflower seed butter come to mind!
Gah – delicious!!
That cheese sauce looks perfect!!! thanks for sharing:)
Need to try that sauce!!
Honetsly as soon as I see a really long ingredients list I know I won’t be making the recipe. I am a college student and the only vegan in the house, so I am always looking for minimalistic and easy vegan recipes. I don’t have the money or the space to keep every different kind of flour, sugar, or other ingredient on hand. I am really looking forward to that pizza recipe!
I’d like to see more easy ways to change a regular recipe into GF without a big hassle of different flours or other things (although that’s really hard, but definitely do-able). I also HATE to bust out (and then clean) the food processor. If there’s a really delicious sounding recipe that I have all the ingredients for, but requires a food processor (and/or blender), 9 times out of 10 I’ll pass it up because I don’t feel like cleaning the food processor. I just want EASY not hard or “over-done”. Everything is so complicated now-a-days… we need to shorten the steps and then more people will want to get in the kitchen and cook!
My biggest problems are too many ingredients and too expensive ingredients! I live in a studio alone and I’m building up my kitchen! If there are too many things I’d have to buy I move on to another recipe!
My challenge is being intimidated in the kitchen. I don’t have too much confidence in my cooking skills, so I tend to avoid trying new things all together and I get stuck eating the same things over and over. I like ‘quick and dirty’ recipes, especially is they have me trying out new ingredients and cooking methods because they aren’t as intimidating yet they have me trying out new things.
This looks awesome! I can’t wait to try it (with arrowroot or some other GF substitute; I’ll let you know how it goes). It’s true that simple wins the day in my kitchen — both in recipes I create and those I follow. But needing to eat GF and vegetarian can sometimes be a challenge to that goal, so I definitely resonate with what you’re saying. I’m excited to see what you come up with! :)
I recently embarked on a plant-based diet. A lot of recipes I have tried are labor intensive with lots of ingredients and tons of dirty dishes, blender, pots, etc. I am not a spring chicken and have a hard time standing for long periods of time in the kitchen. So fewer ingredients and less standing/cleanup time is a bonus. Looking forward to trying the Cheeze Sauce recipe. Need to get some more yeast flakes. Thanks for doing the experimenting and sharing your successes!