Mac & Cheeze (take 2)
I like trying different recipes for mac & cheeze. I make my own version most often, but I’m always up for improving and changing my recipes when I can.
Recently, I saw that VegNews had an interesting recipe. They use potatoes and carrots for the base (certainly healthier than my version) and cashews for the creaminess. I’m a huge fan of cashews to make sauces rich and creamy. So I made the recipe and was intrigued. The texture was AWESOME, the color was good, it was a little on the salty side… overall really nice. But it tasted a little too vegetable-y for my liking.
Now, vegan mac & cheese doesn’t really taste 100% like the non-vegan stuff. And that’s cool with me. I just want it to taste good, and to satisfy a craving for a creamy baked pasta dish, you know? My other post has more of my thoughts on that.
I decided to combine my recipe with with the VegNews recipe. I kept the potato and the carrots for the base, added some of my favorite flavorings, and left out some of theirs. For example, I took out the onion/garlic/shallots. I’m not the biggest fan of those things to begin with, but I don’t ever remember having mac & cheese taste like onions. I know I just said it doesn’t have to taste the same, but those just aren’t the flavors I think of when I imagine mac & cheese, you know?
Again, for easy link finding, here’s VegNew’s awesome recipe. And without further ado, here’s my interpretation:
VegYum Mac & Cheeze
Serves 3ish
8-10 Oz Whole Wheat Rotini
2 Cups Steamed Broccoli Florets
2 Pieces of Bread, toasted and ground to breadcrumbs
1 Cup Peeled, Finely Chopped Potatoes
1/4 Cup Peeled, Finely Chopped Carrots
1 Cup Water
1/3 Cup Raw Cashews
1 Tbs Miso (any kind, I like red)
1 Tbs Tahini
1 Tbs Lemon Juice (sub: 2 tsp White Wine Vinegar)
1/2 tsp Dijon Mustard
1/3 Cup Earth Balance Margarine
1/3 Cup Nutritional Yeast
1 to 1 1/2 tsp Salt
Black Pepper to taste
Paprika for sprinkling
Preheat oven to 350º
Heat a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add pasta and cook until al dente. Drain and set aside.
Meanwhile, steam broccoli and set aside. I use my rice cooker. Simply put the florets in the cooker with 2-3 Tbs of hot water and turn the cooker on. Broccoli will be bright green and tender-crisp when done. Don’t forget about it in there–it’ll finish cooking before the rice cooker clicks off, so if you forget about it, you’ll overcook your broccoli. Mine takes less than 10 minutes to cook.
Make sure the carrots and potatoes are chopped very small; this will reduce the cooking time greatly. Place the chopped potatoes and carrots in small sauce pan that has a lid. Add the 1 cup of water. Boil covered until tender, 10-15 minutes.
While the potatoes and carrots are cooking, add the remaining ingredients to the blender (cashew, miso, lemon juice, mustard, earth balance, nut. yeast, salt and pepper). Once potatoes and carrots are done cooking, add them and their cooking water to the blender as well. Blend until VERY smooth. If needed, add soymilk or water 1 Tbs at a time to thin. Taste for seasoning.
Toast the bread and process into crumbs.
Toss the cooked pasta and broccoli with the sauce. Place in a casserole dish and top with breadcrumbs, black pepper, and paprika.
Bake for 25 minute at 350º F until browned and bubbly. Serve.
I think I’ll make this version whenever I have potatoes handy. It’s a tiny bit lighter than my other version, but it still has a lot of flavor and creaminess. And it saves on soymilk, too!
Oh my goodness–I cannot wait to try this!
You know I’ve never made a veg version of mac and cheese, and I’ve been wanting to for so long – there is something so great about a creamy pasta dish – total comfort food, perfect for this frozen weather…this looks so delicious, can’t wait to try it!
Oh! Yum! Vegan Mac and Cheese is one of the few things my kids are always asking for and this sounds so good! I can’t wait to try it.
that looks so amazingly delicious! I’ve tried different vegan mac n’ cheeze recipes out on my sister (extremely non-vegan sister) and she would eat like two bites and be like ‘gross’ but I’m not giving up I’m definitely going to make this one for her and hope for success! Thanks heaps
The Swiss version of mac+cheese (älpermagrone) includes potatoes, but not other vegetables, though that would be interesting. Your flavourings, too, look great.
i can’t do the cashews. we have food allergies egg, milk and peanuts i am not doing tree nuts right now, what could i do instead?? it looks so good
Mmm… I haven’t ventured to make any kind of vegan mac’n'cheese type dish but I think this recipe has swayed me. I’m adding this to my recipe queue to try out in the next few weeks. The creamy pasta dish looks like the perfect winter comfort food!
I’ve been making the VegNews recipe for quite some time now, and now I’m intrigued by your version. I too revised the recipe, but I left in the onions (because I love them in everything). I never really liked mac ‘n’ cheese when I was omni, so to me, it tasted fantastic, but my friends and family thought my version wasn’t quite “right” as well… good, but not right. So I added nutritional yeast and a half block of Follow Your Heart Vegan Gourmet- Cheddar style, because it has that sort of processed nacho-y flavor, and they loved it. I still make it “my” way pretty often though!
Mmm… looks yummy!
That looks like a pretty tasty mac and “cheese”!
Mmmm… I’ve been craving a dish like this! I love comfort foods such as these. Hubby does too. Thanks for sharing this recipe! :)
I can’t wait to try this – both versions. Thank you so much for sharing it. Happy eating!
I’ve never had Mac & Cheese with cashews but I cannot even tell you how good this looks right now!!!
Holy Mac and Cheese, Batman! That looks and sounds divine! What an interesting take on M&C, cool! :)
This looks so tasty and I really want to try it but I have an aversion to nutritional yeast. Is this common? I don’t know any other vegans, so I don’t really have a point of reference besides my own.
You don’t say what to do with the potatoes and carrots once they’re cooked. I assume you add them, with cooking water, to the blended ingredients. Or do they just add an earthy bouquet to the kitchen aromas?
also good additions to a vegan mac & cheese is a bunch of roasted (with olive oil/salt/pepper) cauliflour or broccoli.
so good!
My inlaws went through the Weimar Institute in California and when they came to visit made that version of mac and “cheese…” it was very similar with the cashew cream, but otherwise was only onion powder, garlic powder, onions, and pimentos. I kept saying “I can’t believe I like this,” as someone who adores mac and cheese.
I’m definitely no vegetarian or vegan, but I’d totally eat that dish. And I’d throw the onions back in, since my mom always made mac & cheese with onions :)
Thanks for helping me figure out what to make for dinner tonight.
I don’t normally eat mac and cheeze as I didn’t grow up with it, but that looks awesome! Now I want to try some! :-)
Is that a Le Creuset baking dish? I just bought one a few weeks ago and have been using it obsessively. Now I have another recipe to try it with! Thanks!
I’ve seen that VegNews recipe but haven’t tried it. The potato/carrot base sounds interesting. I honestly haven’t tried a vegan mac & cheeze recipe that I didn’t like.
This looks delicious, creamy and a novel twist on the usual nutritional yeast sauces.
I saw this on your blog this morning, and came home to make some approximation of it this evening. I substituted almond butter for the cashews because like the commenter above, I can’t eat cashews. (And also peas for the broccoli just because we didn’t have any broccoli left in the house.) It was very tasty! My child refused to even try it, so I don’t know whether he liked it.
I think if you are allergic to tree nuts, one good substitution for nuts or nut butter in a recipe like this is tahini. I see that it’s an ingredient here anyway–just put in 1/3 cup of tahini in place of the raw cashews and see how that goes. Sesame seeds aren’t tree nuts. Another possibility is sunflower seed butter.
How funny- I just made your other version for the first time yesterday (which was delicious)! Can’t wait to make this one now too!
Holy smokes, this is good, even though I messed it up.
I didn’t read all the way through before cooking (typical me), so I added the broccoli and black pepper to the blender. Only after did I realize that everything “except” the breadcrumbs also meant except the broccoli, black pepper, and paprika (fortunately I caught this before blenderizing the paprika).
Despite this, and other errors (I’m a klutz in the kitchen), it turned out to be very delicious. Perhaps you’ve come up with an idiot-proof recipe!
Oh dear, Eric, that’s my fault, not yours! I’ll edit the directions to be clearer! Glad you liked it anyway!
I made this tonight for my mom who’s a celiac and a vegan, and it was very good. I used brown rice macaroni pasta. To make the breadcrum, I mixed almond meal with paprika, italian seasonings, and some melted butter, and it baked into a delicious gluten-free topping.
Hi,
I have been reading your blog quite a while, and have always been impressed with your photography and recipes.
I thought you may be interested in an Australian interpretation of mac’n'cheez: http://veganik.wordpress.com/2009/01/05/basic-fake-cheese-pasta-sauce/
-Veganik
Wow this looks creamily delicious. I’ll try this recipe soon!
I am going to make this next week. My kids are going to love it. Thank you for sharing.
Wow – this is soooo good! I made the VegNews version and look forward to trying your version soon.
I was dubious until I tasted the finished sauce. Then I couldn’t wait for it to come out of the oven. Super! Thank you again for sharing.
sounds totally delicious!
I’ve been wanting to try something like this for some time now. The pictures look delicious!
oooh that looks so good! i think it would be good with some red bell pepper too. im always looking to add more veggies to my pasta.
I’m probably the only person alive who doesn’t like mac & cheese, but I will admit: I’m tempted by this.
Cool.
Mmm looks yummy!
Quick question: what camera do you use?
My taste buds are currently freaking out, seeing as how this dish is currently incubating in my oven!!
Many thanks!!
Looks great. My husband would love this recipe interpretation of yours – thanks for sharing!
Cheers,
Kristen
Oh yum, I’m always looking for a good mac and cheeze recipe!
Yum. Hello, tomorrow night’s dinner.
Hey!
I have already tried some of your recipes, and we all loved them. Today I made this one and I’ll certainly make it again!
Beautiful! Y’know, I saw a similar recipe in this month’s “Shape” magazine that called for cauliflower (and real cheese, but obviously one can sub). I’m definitely going to give yours a try!
I made this the other night and it was absolutely DELICIOUS. Absolutely perfect.
I must say your photography is stunning!! all your food photos are delectable…I can almost see myself becoming a vegan if I get to eat the types of food you create :)
We made this for lunch yesterday and it was amazing.
In fact, I just ate some of the leftovers for lunch today, so I can verify that it even reheats well.
Delicious!!
My wife and I made this for dinner last night. As a long time lover of the original Kraft, blue box Mac and Cheese, this recipe had many expectations to meet. It’s simply fantastic. It’s hard to believe that you can make a sauce so creamy without any dairy (we didn’t even need to add soy milk). We weren’t really able to pull off bread crumbs, so we took eight of the whole wheat saltines and crumbled them on top…fantastic!
My only regret is that the pasta and the broccoli was slightly undercooked. We thought the baking in the oven would finish them off, but not enough. So next time an extra few minutes pre-cooking for those items.
Also, I think this is more like a 4 serving recipe. We did the math on it and it’s something like 2,100 calories for the whole thing. Even divided into quarters, it’s still a pretty huge portion.
Great recipe! I made it and loved it. Next time, I think I’ll up the potato/carrot amounts- it was super, super rich and creamy, so much so that I think I would prefer more vegetables and fewer nuts next time- but that’s just me. I definitely plan on making it again, next time doubling the amount of sauce and saving it for dipping crackers, veggies, chips… Delish!
soooo good. had it for dinner last night and am having left overs for lunch today. but i couldn’t wait for lunch and sneaked a taste. it’s even good cold!