Vegan Alfredo Sauce No Cashews

When you go vegan, you may fear that you’ll never have a tasty bowl of hearty and filling fettuccine alfredo again. But, with this easy recipe, you’ll be making a delicious vegan fettuccine alfredo in no time. It can seem crazy to make an alfredo sauce with no cashews, but trust me guys, this vegan alfredo sauce is so good, you won’t even know it’s dairy free or vegan, or nut free!

You’ll be ready to lick the bowl of creamy goodness. Simply, it’s the best vegan alfredo sauce we have ever made.

While some vegan alfredo recipes use raw cashews or cashew milk, this recipe ditches those ideas and focuses on using nutritional yeast and soy milk of that creaminess and cheesy flavor you want for your fettuccini alfredo.

If you and the family are in the mood for another pasta dish with rich flavors, but want something other than alfredo pasta, you must try this Zoodles with Arugula Pesto. It’s another satisfying dinner the whole family will love.

Why you’ll love this Vegan Alfredo Sauce

• Super easy to make and you don’t have to soak cashews to make a creamy sauce
• Vegan sauce, which means dairy free too! Perfect for those with a nut allergy or dairy allergy
• Full of so much flavor
• Satisfying- just want you want to enjoy when you’re craving a pasta and white sauce

Ingredients needed

Get more info on the healthy alfredo sauce ingredients, like the quantities, in the recipe card below.

• Vegan Fettuccine – You can use any pasta shape you’d like though, and we always use gluten free fettuccine!
• Cauliflower
• Mushroom
• Garlic 
• Soy milk
• Nutritional yeast
• Olive oil
• Salt
• Black pepper 
• Parsley

How to Make Vegan Alfredo Sauce with No Cashews

Fill your large pot with water and place it on the stovetop. Over high heat, bring the water to a rapid boil.

While you’re waiting for the water to boil, cut the cauliflower into small pieces.

Once the water is boiling, add the cauliflower and boil for at least 10 minutes, or until they’re soft enough to use to make a puree with.

Over high heat, place a frying pan on it to heat it up.

While the pan is preheating, slice the mushrooms and cook until they’re golden brown.

Add the garlic and cook until fragrant and brown.

In a saucepan, add water and salt. Bring the water to a boil and add pasta. Cook according to your package instructions, or until pasta is fork tender.

While the pasta cooks, make the sauce.

Add boiled cauliflower, salt, pepper, soy milk, nutritional yeast, and olive oil to the bowl of your food processor.

Mix until it turns into a creamy sauce.

Over low heat, pour this freshly made sauce into a saucepan or wok. Heat the sauce for a few minutes before adding the mushrooms and cooked pasta.

Toss everything together until well combined.

Serve, add chopped parsley for garnish, if desired. Enjoy.

Storage

For best results, when you store your pasta and alfredo, try to keep the leftover sauce separately from the cooked pasta if possible. If you store the sauce with the pasta, the sauce can harden on the pasta and make reheating it quite difficult.

When you go to reheat your vegan alfredo, I suggest putting it in a saucepan like you heated it on the stove once you made it, over medium heat, and then adding in the pasta to toss it in or making fresh pasta to coat with the sauce. Make sure to stir well and you can add any extra soy milk if needed if it’s too thick so it becomes your desired consistency.

I don’t recommend trying to freeze any of this for later. The creamy vegan alfredo sauce won’t thaw properly and oftentimes gluten free pasta doesn’t hold up well after freezing and thawing. There are a few brands that do hold up well when freezing and thawing, but many brands do not withstand the freezing and thawing process.

Helpful Tips

• Be very careful when cooking the mushrooms. You don’t want to overcook them or they’ll dry out.
• If you can’t fit everything into your food processor, you can place everything in your high-speed blender and carefully process it all together there.
• You can easily double, or even triple the creamy dairy-free alfredo sauce to make more sauce and pasta to serve a crowd.
• Enjoy this pasta dish with your favorite big, green, healthy salad recipe for a nice complete meal.

Recipe Variations

• Use fresh parsley for garnish whenever possible. You can also add vegan parmesan cheese as a garnish if desired.
• If you don’t want to use fettuccine noodles, you can swap it out for your favorite pasta. This creamy alfredo sauce will go on any pasta of your choice, that you have on hand.
• The first time you make this, stick to the recipe. The second time, or from then on out, feel free to alter it as you see fit.
• Keep in mind that whatever non-dairy milk you choose to use will have a different fat and water content, so your sauce may need to simmer for more time or for less time than the directions describe. This can vary from brand to brand, so please keep an eye on the sauce as you make it.
• If you need to lighten up the thick sauce, you can add a squirt of two of lemon juice.
• To make garlic alfredo, add some fresh minced garlic or some garlic powder to bring in some more flavor to this easy vegan alfredo sauce.

What is in traditional alfredo sauce?

Regular alfredo sauce is a creamy pasta sauce that’s typically white and made from butter, parmesan cheese, and heavy cream. None of that is vegan, or dairy free. So, we had to use alternatives for these ingredients to create the perfect vegan alfredo sauce recipe.

In our cauliflower alfredo sauce, we use soy milk to get the creamy texture and factor into the recipe. Fettuccine Alfredo is the epitome of comfort food and for a lot of people, the alfredo and pasta can feel very heavy on your stomach and make you feel sick if you eat too much just from the rich ingredients. But, with these vegan simple ingredients for the dairy-free alfredo sauce recipe, that overfull, overindulged feeling doesn’t happen as easily or as often.

Is there a non dairy substitute for heavy cream?

Why yes, there are actually a couple of different options to use instead of heavy cream that are dairy free. The most important thing to consider is the fat content of your milk alternative. Heavy cream is high in fat content and whatever option you choose to use in its place will need to be as well.

Coconut milk is a good plant milk alternative that has a high fat content but it is not usually recommended for alfredo sauce because of the strong taste it usually brings with it. Instead, find the almond milk, or oat milk with the highest fat content you can find and go for that.

Do I have to use soy milk?

I have only tested this vegan alfredo sauce using soy milk. I can imagine that you would be able. touse another plant based, dairy free milk. But there are some things to consider. Depending on your choice, the color of your sauce may change, but more importantly, you don’t want to choose a dairy free milk alternative that has a strong flavor, like coconut milk as that will definitely change the taste of your cashew free alfredo sauce.

If you like our pasta dishes like our vegan, gluten free, and nut free macaroni and cheese or the Sage Pumpkin pasta, we know you’ll love this vegan cashew alfredo sauce.