I love making vegan cheese alternatives, but I’ve gotten so many requests to make a nut-free vegan cheese sauce.
I personally love my cheese recipes that contain cashews, tofu, and/or miso paste. Two of my favorites are the Butternut Cheese Sauce in this Crispy Baked Mac and Cheese and the Creamy Tofu Ricotta in this Vegetable Lasagna.
But I also wanted to create an allergen-friendly recipe that was free of all nuts and soy, as well as made with nourishing, whole food plant-based ingredients. And I am so excited to share this nut-free vegan cheese sauce recipe with you all! Despite not containing any nuts or soy (or even oil), it is luxuriously creamy and silky smooth. And it’s so healthy that you’re basically just eating vegetables, so lather on as much cheese as you’d like.
Let’s talk about the main ingredients that make up this sauce!
Cauliflower: If you’ve been in the vegan food space for awhile, you’re already aware of cauliflower’s secret powers. Once cooked, it gets creamy and rich, and brings a luscious texture to this cheese sauce without requiring cashews.
Butternut Squash: This brings some heft and a velvety texture to this sauce. And, of course, that golden yellow-orange color reminiscent of cheese. I’ve tried making vegan cheese sauces with carrots and sweet potatoes instead, but they bring an unwanted sweetness (cheese should not be sweet)! To save time, I sometimes opt for pre-peeled, pre-cut butternut squash at the grocery store.
Garlic: This recipe calls for a copious amount of garlic (10 cloves). Since the ingredient list is minimal and there are no soy products involved (which add umami), adding a lot of garlic is essential to making this sauce flavor.
Nutritional Yeast: Since we’re using a lot of vegetables (8 cups), we need a generous amount of nutritional yeast to bring that cheezy flavor. The recipe calls for 1/2 cup, but you can add up to 3/4 cup for a more pronounced cheezy flavor.
Coconut Milk: While cauliflower does make this sauce quite creamy, we need a little helping hand from some full-fat coconut milk. Not a lot though. Just 3/4 cup for 8 cups of vegetables and 1 1/2 cups of vegetable broth.
How to use Nut-Free Vegan Cheese Sauce
- For mac and cheese!
- Drizzle over roasted or steamed vegetables
- Make homemade nachos
- Add to a quesadilla
- Spread over homemade pizza and bake in the oven
And be sure to check out my Youtube video for three easy recipes using this Nut-Free Vegan Cheese Sauce!
-
Simple Cheesy Pasta
-
Tex-Mex Tempeh Quesadillas
Who should make this Nut-Free Vegan Cheese Sauce?
- Anyone who has nut allergies
- Anyone with a soy intolerance
- Anyone eating a whole food plant-based diet
- Anyone watching their caloric intake
- Anyone who wants a nutrient-dense, plant-based alternative to cheese!
Watch! How to make Nut Free Vegan Cheese Sauce
NUT-FREE VEGAN CHEESE SAUCE | 1 sauce, 3 recipes
Is this Nut-Free Vegan Cheese Sauce Healthy?
I never calculate or include calories in my recipes, as I try to maintain a balanced space here. But, since this cheese sauce is so remarkably cream yet healthy, I do want to point something out.
There’s less than 125 calories in 1 CUP of this sauce, or about 30 calories per 1/4 cup serving! So yeah, really, lather on as much cheese as you’d like! Personally, I think 1 cup is a perfectly acceptable serving amount :) And of course, there’s a great deal of nutrients in this cheese sauce, thanks to the fiber- and vitamin-rich cauliflower and butternut squash
If you try out this recipe, please leave a comment below with your feedback – it always helps out the blog and I love hearing from you!
Big Vegan Flavor
Techniques and 150 recipes to master vegan cooking.
Nut-Free Vegan Cheese Sauce
Ingredients
- 4 heaped cups of cauliflower florets (about 1 medium head of cauliflower, ~400g)
- 4 cups (about 18 ounces or ~500g) of butternut squash, chopped into 3/4 inch pieces
- 32 ounces (~945mL) water (stovetop method only)
- 32 ounces (~945mL) vegetable broth
- 1/4 cup (60mL) water (can substitute with 1 tablespoon olive oil or avocado oil)
- 10 cloves garlic, minced
- 1/2 cup nutritional yeast (add more for a more pronounced cheesier flavor)
- 3/4 cup (~195ml) canned full-fat coconut milk
- 1 teaspoon hot or sweet paprika
- A pinch of cayenne pepper, (optional for a lightly spicy version)
- 1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
- Black pepper to taste
Instructions
INSTANT POT METHOD
- Add the cauliflower florets, chopped butternut squash, and 4 cups vegetable broth to your Instant Pot. Secure the lid and set the Pressure Release to Sealing. Select the Pressure Cook setting at high pressure and set the cook time to 4 minutes.
- Once the 4-minute timer has completed and beeps, perform a quick pressure release by carefully switching the Pressure Release knob from Sealing to Venting.
- Open the pot and transfer the vegetables to a blender. Reserve 1 1/2 cups of the cooking broth. Add 1 1/4 cups to the blender, leaving 1/4 cup to the side.
- While the vegetables are cooking, heat the 1/4 cup water in a nonstick skillet over medium heat (alternatively, instead of the water, you can heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil or avocado oil). Once the water is simmering (or the oil is shimmering), add the minced garlic. Cook for 3 minutes, stirring frequently to prevent sticking, until the water mostly evaporates and the mixture is fragrant.
- Transfer the garlic mixture to the blender with the cooked vegetables and reserved cooking liquid. Add the nutritional yeast, coconut milk paprika, salt, and black pepper to taste. Blend until the sauce is smooth, thick, and creamy, adding the reserved 1/4 cup cooking liquid as needed to thin out the sauce. Season to taste with additional salt and pepper as needed.
- If you have leftovers, transfer them to an airtight container and store in the fridge for up to 1 week. Or you can freeze them in smaller portions for a longer period of time.
STOVETOP METHOD
- Add the 4 cups of water and the 4 cups of vegetable broth in a large deep skillet or Dutch oven and bring the mixture to a boil.
- Add the cauliflower florets and chopped butternut squash, cover the pan, and cook for 8-10 minutes, or until the vegetables are fork-tender.
- Transfer the vegetables to a blender. Reserve 1 1/2 cups of the cooking liquid. Add 1 1/4 cups to the blender, leaving 1/4 cup to the side.
- Follow remaining steps 4 and 5, as outlined above.
- If you have leftovers, transfer them to an airtight container and store in the fridge for up to 1 week. Or you can freeze them in smaller portions for a longer period of time.
&caption=%20&description=&redirect_uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2F)
 - )
Hi, love your recipes and thank you for what you do! There are so many recipes I’d like to try that use coconut milk but not a big fan of the coconut flavor. Have you come across one that doesn’t taste like coconut in recipes?
Hi Maggie, thanks for your support! :)
With all of the layered flavors we use at RPL, the end dish does not end up tasting coconutty. Our go-to brand for coconut milk is Native Forest and we’ve never had an issue with it tasting coconutty.
We hope this helps!
I love your recepies!
But right now I’m bit confused… how can it be only 3 grams of fat, when coconutmilk has 24 grams fat per 100 gram?
In this recepie there is almost 200 grams of coconutmilk, and around 48 grams of fat just from the coconutmilk?
How much is a batch, and how big is a serving in this recepie?
It seem delicious though, and somebodys said it gets reeeally tasty if it can sit in the fridge a day or so, the ingredients “merge” and makes it even better!
Thankyou for all great recepies you are sharing!
Hi Monica, we’re thrilled you enjoy the recipes! :)
The nutrition facts shown here are per serving. There are 12 servings in this recipe!
195ml of full fat coconut milk is 34g of fat, divided by 12 is roughly 3g.
We hope you get a chance to try the recipe!