Cheesy Cashew Nut Sauce (Or Dip)
This flavoursome vegan cheesy cashew nut sauce can be used for pouring over steamed veg and baked potatoes or as a lasagne component. Make it slightly thicker and it makes an excellent dip. Not only does it taste good, but it’s gluten-free too.
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Oh I do love my power blender. It makes such beautifully smooth sauces and has encouraged me to be so much more adventurous than I used to be. Vegan cheese sauce has been on my radar for a couple of years now. Last month, I finally got around to making some. This cheesy cashew nut sauce really is a revelation and I’ll be making it a regular part of my repertoire.
Nutritional Yeast
Sceptical as ever, I doubted the many claims I’ve heard that you can make a vegan cheese sauce that actually tastes like cheese sauce. How wrong I was. Even CT was fooled. Nutritional yeast is a key ingredient and it gives that savoury umami note that is essential in a good hard cheese.
Until I attended the vegan cookery course at The Vegetarian Society last year, I’d never really come across nutritional yeast before. It has many benefits such as a high Vitamin B12 content and it’s a complete protein to boot.
As usual I’ve tried to make this cheesy cashew nut sauce as nutritious as possible. I’ve seen some vegan versions where potato forms the base of the sauce, but I wanted my version to be protein rich. Cashew nuts seemed like the obvious answer. In addition to the nuts and nutritional yeast, I added an onion, garlic and a carrot for extra nutrients as well as colour.
Ultra Smooth Sauce
The sauce is super simple to make, though a little planning is needed. It’s best to soak the cashew nuts for at least two hours before blending and the vegetables need cooking in order to make the stock. I used a little vinegar to replicate the acidity of cheese. I think I achieved that cheesy cheddar tang I was after.
The small jug of my Optimum G2.3 induction blender came into its own. I used it to whizz the ingredients together to produce an ultra smooth sauce. It has an ingenious lid with blades that you can rotate by hand whilst the mixture is blending. This puts an end to ingredients getting stuck and refusing to budge – something that used to frustrate me hugely.
Cheesy Cashew Nut Sauce
I’m rather pleased with what I’ve come up with. The beauty of this cheesy cashew nut sauce is that it really does taste like cheese sauce. It can, however, be enjoyed by pretty much anyone. Anyone except those with a nut allergy of course. As well as being dairy free and vegan, it’s also gluten free.
My cheesy cashew nut sauce works equally well as a sauce or a dip. It can be used to make lasagne type dishes, poured over a baked potato or steamed veg. In fact it can be treated in any other way you’d use a traditional cheese sauce. We enjoyed this as a dip one day, spread over bread another day and poured over a baked potato and steamed broccoli on the third day. Not bad, eh?
Other Recipes for Vegan Sauces You Might Like
- Barbecue sauce
- Chilli sauce
- Cranberry sauce
- Mayonnaise
- Quick tomato sauce with seaweed
- Red wine gravy
- Tahini sauce with clementines and smoked paprika
For even more sauce recipe inspiration, head over to my saucy sauces board on Pinterest.
Keep in Touch
Thanks for visiting Tin and Thyme. If you make this cheesy cashew nut sauce, I’d love to hear about it in the comments below. And do please rate the recipe. Have you any top tips? Do share photos on social media too and use the hashtag #tinandthyme, so I can spot them.
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If you’d like more dip recipes, follow the link and you’ll find I have quite a lot of them. All delicious, of course.
Choclette x
Cheesy Cashew Nut Sauce. PIN IT.
Cheesy Cashew Nut Sauce – The Recipe
Cheesy Cashew Nut Sauce or Dip (Vegan & Gluten Free)
Equipment
- power blender
Ingredients
- 100 g cashew nuts soaked & rinsed
- 50-100 ml vegetable stock depending on how thick or runny you want the sauce
- 2 tbsp nutritional yeast
- 1 tsp apple cider vinegar I used kombucha vinegar
- 1 tsp English mustard
- ½ tsp tamari (affiliate link)
Stock
- 1 medium carrot scrubbed
- 1 small onion peeled and roughly chopped
- 1 clove garlic peeled
- 3 black peppercorns
- 1 bay leaf
- 1 parsley stalk
- 1 pinch sea salt
Instructions
- Soak the cashew nuts in water for at least 2 hours then rinse and drain.100 g cashew nuts
- Make the stock by throwing the veg, herbs, pepper and salt in a pot and covering with water. Cover and bring to the boil, then simmer for 20-30 minutes.1 medium carrot, 1 small onion, 1 clove garlic, 3 black peppercorns, 1 bay leaf, 1 parsley stalk, 1 pinch sea salt
- Drain the stock and remove the bay leaf and parsley stalk from the veg.
- Place the drained veg into a power blender with the remaining ingredients and 50ml of the liquid stock. Blitz until the sauce is smooth. This will give a good dipping consistency. To make a pourable sauce, add more stock until the required consistency is achieved.50-100 ml vegetable stock, 2 tbsp nutritional yeast, 1 tsp apple cider vinegar, 1 tsp English mustard, ½ tsp tamari (affiliate link)
Notes
Nutrition Estimate
Sharing
I’m sharing my recipe for cheesy cashew nut sauce with Searching for Spice for Cook Once Eat Twice.
I’ve been meaning to make cashew cheese for ages – will have to give this a try
Well this isn’t quite cheese, it’s a sauce really. But it’s jolly delicious.
I love making cheesey vegan food out of cashews – I always buy a big bag of them when I see them in the supermarket!
I wasn’t surprised it was good as I’ve heard so many foodies go on about it, but it was even nicer than I was expecting.
I keep reading about the combination of nutritional yeast and cashews to make a veggie cheese-like dip and am so intrigued. It does look really delicious!
Gosh, how terribly remiss of me. I’ve only just spotted your comment Kavey. I do apologise. Have you tried nutritional yeast yet?
Welcome to the wonderful vegan world of nooch & cashew cheese!
I love it when non-vegans discover all this stuff for themselves…. part of me wants to nonchalantly say, “Yeah, lots of us have been making this stuff for a decade – fab isn’t it?” but the bigger part wants to say, “OK, you’ve mastered this, now it’s time to make seitan!”
LOL!
Lovely recipe, Choclette, and it’s brilliant that you’re introducing it to a wider audience too! Keep it up! xx
Hahaha, I know how you feel Nico. it’s the same for me when it comes to foraging or cultured foods or even wholefoods.
I’m intrigued by vegan cheese sauces and would love to try nutritional yeast just so I can see for myself what it’s like. It’s great that it’s so similar to a traditional cheese sauce and can even fool people! Thanks for sharing with #CookOnceEatTwice
Yes, it’s quite amazing and I didn’t really believe it until I tried it for myself.
I need to make this ASAP. I had something very similar in Norway over the weekend. Does it keep for a few days? If I don’t have tamari can I leave it out?
Hi Sus. Ooh Norway, how fabulous. It will keep in the fridge for a few days no problem and yes if you don’t have tamari or other good quality soy sauce, just use sea salt instead.
I love homemade nut based cheeses! I was also skeptical about nutritional yeast when I first heard of it but now I use it all the time! I love how versatile this recipe is 🙂
Yes, it’s one of those things that just has to be tried I reckon. Now I’ve opened and used my pack of nutritional yeast, I’ll be using it a lot more.
I have been a fan of “nooch” for awhile, with my favourite using being to sprinkle it over popcorn. No cooking! And I do make sauce with it too, but truly nothing like this. I am putting this on my must try very soon list. Thanks for sharing. And the new Froothie blender sounds fab!
Oh “nooch”, what a fabulous word. How did that come about? I’ll have to try it over popcorn now, sounds like a very good idea.
It looks so creamy and delicious. I love how smooth the blender got the sauce/dip!
I’ve said it before and I expect I’ll say it many times again: I would be lost without my Froothie blender 🙂
What a fabulous idea for a dip Choclette. It looks so cheesey, creamy and lush. Mmmmmm! Shared!
Thanks Jac. I was quite surprised to find it really did taste cheesy – a great discovery.
I must admit, I have yet to try a “cheese” sauce with nutritional yeast. I am totally skeptical. I will have to try it sometime, though. This looks so tasty!
I was sceptical too Kate and it took me a long time to try making one. I’m so glad I did 🙂
I love vegan cheese sauces and think cashews are a great base – I have tried potato based sauces and think they just don’t have the right texture. Serving it over potato and broccoli though sounds wonderful
Potato just doesn’t appeal somehow, though the sauce went wonderfully well on top of potatoes. I did take some photos, but they weren’t great, so didn’t include them. Now I’ve made vegan cheese sauce once, there will be no stopping me.
You can never have too many cheezy dips, eh? Will cause a snacking addiction!
I think I might already have a snacking addiction – oops!
I too love to use cashews to make dressings and dips! This looks terrific!
Thanks Angie. I’m fairly new to using nuts to make sauces, but I’ve made a few now and I’ve been happy with them all.