As I was taking pictures of this dish, my husband said, “I thought you already posted the mac and cheeze recipe on your blog.” And honestly, as often as I talk about the Vegan Yum Yum Mac and Cheeze recipe, I’m surprised that I haven’t posted my version on here. Lauren Ulm’s recipe really is the best version of the comfort food staple that I’ve had since becoming vegan.
Whenever I make this dish (and I make it ALL the time), I always double the cheezy sauce recipe because I like my mac and cheeze rich and creamy. And the sauce is wonderful on its own; I’ve used it to make a vegan chile con queso to pour over nachos.
As far as the pasta, I like to use whole-wheat shell pasta because it holds more of the sauce, but regular macaroni works well for all you mac and cheeze purists out there.
For the bread crumb topping, I typically throw a couple of slices of bread into my food processor and pulse a few times. You can also use store-bought bread crumbs if you don’t have a food processor or are feeling lazy. But this time around, I decided to use some panko crumbs that I had on hand. And that’s probably what I’ll use from here on out because they added an extra crunch to the dish that you just can’t get with regular bread crumbs.
So, without further ado, here is the mac and cheeze recipe:
Mac and Cheeze (adapted from Vegan Yum Yum)
Ingredients:
1 lb shell pasta or elbow macaroni (I used whole-wheat)
1 cup bread crumbs
Cheezy Sauce:
2/3 cup Earth Balance margarine
½ cup all-purpose flour
2 tbsp miso (I used red)
2 tbsp tahini
2 tbsp tomato paste
6 tbsp low-sodium tamari
2 tbsp lemon juice
2 ½ cups soy or almond milk
2/3 cup nutritional yeast
Salt and pepper to taste
Directions:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Prepare the pasta according to directions.
While the pasta is cooking, mix together the miso, tahini, tomato paste, tamari, and lemon juice in a small bowl and set aside.
Melt the margarine in a saucepan over medium-low heat. As soon as the margarine is melted, add the flour and whisk until dissolved to form a roux. Whisk the miso mixture into the roux and keep stirring.
Slowly whisk in the milk. Whisk constantly to avoid burning and to avoid lumps. Turn up the heat a bit and add the nutritional yeast, salt, and pepper. The mixture will thicken as it heats up, but continue to stir. Once it starts to boil, it should be ready.
Add the pasta to a large casserole dish and stir in the cheezy sauce.
Top with bread crumbs.
Place in the oven for about 25 minutes, with the last 2 or 3 minutes under the broiler to brown the top.
For some reason, I always like to serve my mac and cheeze with green beans and sliced tomato.
Enjoy!
wow, this looks and sounds yum… i have tried a handful of mac n cheese recipes and they’ve all fallen short (although i found one that was almost there that used a cashew cream). i’ll have to try this for sure! thanks for (finally) posting!
~wendy
Most of the mac and cheese recipes I’ve tried have fallen short too. They didn’t taste bad, but they certainly weren’t a good mac and cheese substitute. The ingredients in this one sound a little weird, but trust me, they work. And it’s so easy to make. Let me know how it turns out!
Amanda
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