

One of the best tricks to making something creamy and smooth without using milk, butter or oil is to use raw cashews that have been soaked in water.
You can soak them for as little as 10 minutes if you’re in a time crunch, or you can soak them overnight. The longer they soak, the creamier they'll become when you blend them. Just make sure to drain the water before you add them to your recipe.
Cashews will give you healthy fat without empty calories. Use quinoa or brown rice pasta to make it gluten-free.
This Is The Mother Of All Vegan Mac-N-Cheese Recipes
Ingredients
- 1 russet potato, peeled and cut into bite-sized pieces (1 1/2 cups / 240g)
- 1 cup carrot, chopped (130g)
- 1/4 yellow onion, diced (1/2 cup / 65g)
- 2 cups water (475ml) plus another 1/2 cup (120ml), divided
- 1/2 cup raw cashews, soaked in water for 10 minutes to overnight (75g)
- 1/2 cup nutritional yeast (40g)
- 1/2 tsp. turmeric powder
- 1 tsp. salt (6g)
- 3 Tbsp. canned coconut milk, light or full fat (45ml))
- 1 box of gluten free pasta (brown rice or quinoa pasta are my go-tos)
Directions for Cheese Sauce
Place potato, carrot and onion in a pan, cover with 2 cups (475ml) of water and simmer for 20 minutes with the lid on.
After 20 minutes, add the veggies (and whatever liquid that’s left in the pan) to your blender.
Drain the cashews and add them to the blender, along with the nutritional yeast, turmeric, sea salt, coconut milk, and the additional 1/2 cup (120ml) of water.
Blend until the sauce is extremely creamy and smooth, about 2 minutes, depending on your blender.
You may need to scrape the sides down from the blender a couple of times for everything to get incorporated.
Pour the sauce into a container and store in the fridge, or make the mac and cheese right away.
Directions for Pasta
Cook the pasta according to the directions on the box.
Strain pasta and rinse with cold water to stop from cooking. Return to pan.
Turn heat to very low, and pour as much cheese sauce as you want over the pasta.
Add black pepper and salt to taste.
Note
You will have enough cheese sauce for a couple of batches of mac and cheese. Whatever cheese sauce you have left over, just pop in the fridge and use within 7 days.
Find out more about Molly, and the art of clean eating at her website, boldvegan.com

Molly Patrick is the co-founder of cleanfooddirtygirl.com. Molly's expertise used to be drinking red wine and is now on the Whole Food Plant Based diet. She guides people on their journey of changing what, how and why they eat in a way that sticks. Losing weight, getting off from medication and falling in love with life is just a taste of what Molly has to offer.