My family and I are big fans of this pasta sauce! This was one of the first “mac and cheese” recipes I tried when we first started to transfer to a plant-based diet. It has a wonderful creamy texture and a slightly tangy cheesy flavor to the sauce. This is another one of the “regulars” in our home. Not only is the flavor really good, but it’s a relatively simple recipe too. You just steam your broccoli, cook your noodles and blend all the sauce ingredients and it’s ready to go. This is definitely one of my quick-er meals as far as preparation work and time go.
It works great for a meal for leftovers for the next day too which is wonderful since my husband takes it for lunch every time after I make this for dinner. The flavor is the same the next day, and you may need to add about a teastpoon or so of water the next day, but once you do that texture will be the same the next day too.
I have slightly adapted this recipe from the mac and cheese original recipe on yumuniverse.com
- 3 tbsp lemon juice, fresh
- 1 cup water
- 3 heaping tbsp nutritional yeast
- 2-3 tbsp sesame seeds
- 1 cup cashews, soaked
- 4 cups broccoli, chopped
- 2 cups uncooked wheat noodles of choice (we usually use penne or macaroni)
- salt to taste
- Soak your cashews. You can either let them soak in water overnight, or if you're like me, you've forgotten to soak them and need a quicker method. I have placed them in a pot of boiling water and boiled them for about 2 minutes then turned off the heat and let them soak for 10 minutes more. This seems to work just fine and especially for this recipe, it works great.
- Cook your noodles according to the directions on the packaging of the noodles.
- Place broccoli in a pot with ¾ cup water and place a lid on top and steam over medium-high heat for 5-6 minutes or until broccoli is cooked through but not mushy.
- While the broccoli is cooking start adding the sauce ingredients to your blender: lemon juice, water, nutritional yeast, sesame seeds, and soaked cashews. Blend until smooth.
- Once the sauce is smooth, strain your broccoli and then add it to your blender and pulse a few times until the broccoli is well mixed in. If you wish to leave chunks of broccoli make sure to not over-blend.
- Spoon out the noodles into individual bowls, pour sauce over top and sprinkle sea salt to taste on top. Dig in!
Enjoy this Creamy Cheesy Broccoli Pasta!
Kristin
