I am getting SO much great feedback from these daily posts! Yay! I am glad you like it.
You know, for me, going vegetarian was a pretty easy transition. I didn’t really care about eliminating chicken, beef and fish so much. I guess I just never loved eating them. Going from vegetarian to vegan however, is a bit more of a struggle. I really like eggs and cheese. I like creamy, gooey, salty things. I crave them and miss them.
But the fact is, I don’t want to be eating them. Mostly from an ethical standpoint, but also because I don’t think they are good for my health. When I am NOT eating them, I end up filling my plate with healthier choices like vegies and legumes, which have much less fat than dairy and eggs, plus tons of fiber, vitamins, minerals and no cholesterol.
So when I stumble across recipes that allow me to enjoy the creamy, gooey, salty, fatty qualities of cheese, I’m pretty excited. This recipe will become a stand-by for me. I love it and it ticks all the boxes cheese does without the ill effects and cruelty. It also has no tofu, which I know some people avoid due to soy intolerances or other.
Broccoli with Cheeze Sauce (with 2 bean burgers in the background)
Vegan Cheeze Sauce
1 tsp soy sauce
3 Tbsp raw tahini* (golmit in Israel)
1 Tbsp nutritional yeast (NOT Brewer’s yeast and sorry, not available in Israel yet. I order mine from Vegan Essentials.
¼ tsp paprika
1/4 tsp garlic powder
juice of 1/2 lemon
Water to thin to desired consistency.
Put all ingredients except water into a bowl. Mix until smooth. Slowly drizzle in water until it reaches your desired thickness. Now, if this is your first time working with tahini, listen up. At first, the tahini is going to seperate and look like a disaster. Just keep stirring. When you add the water it will separate again and turn white, but just keep stirring and it magically re-emulsifies.
*An additional word to the tahini virgins: Tahini and tahina are the same thing as far as I can tell. But this is not the tahini that is already mixed with spices and watered down to a sauce. This is sold in a jar like peanut butter. You may need a trip to a Middle Eastern or Kosher market to find it in North America. The only ingredients will be “Ground Sesame Seeds”
Now, about that Nutritional yeast. I am working on getting it here to Israel but if anyone (I can think of one of you right now!) knows a way to get this product imported, let me know. As for those who don’t have it, make this sauce anyway. It will lack the cheezy taste of the yeast, but it will still be really, really good.
I served this sauce over steamed broccoli, but really there are many possibilities here. I am wondering how it would taste over whole grain pasta or brown rice, drizzled into a Mexican dish, served as a salad dressing….
I want to close this post today with some news about a new movie coming out in the US this week called Forks Over Knives. Maybe you saw it discussed on the Dr Oz show last week. It is a film about how a Plant-Based Diet can eliminate and even reverse many Western diseases, such as heart disease, diabetes and cancer. I will do my best to get a copy of it when it’s released and maybe we’ll have a movie night here in Kfar Saba. Here’s the trailer… and pass the Vegan Cheeze Sauce please!
