Green Cashew Cream Sauce

We’re out of zucchini and I wanted a pasta sauce, plus I needed breakfast smoothies for this week. 

First I made an unsweetened cashew oat milk.

1 cup raw, unsalted Cashews

1 cup gluten-free Rolled Oats

6 cups water

Blend this on high in a Vita-Mix liquid container for 3 minutes to cook the oats. This can be done on the stovetop. Check the links here for vegan milk to find the stovetop directions link. That might mean making the oat milk first and then adding the cashews in the next step below.

I poured the milk into another container and then started on the cashew cream sauce in the Vita-Mix.

2 cups unsweetened Cashew/Oat Milk (see above)

1/2 pkg frozen Spinach (~8 oz)

3 peeled Carrots

Blend this on high until smooth. Add in -

1/2 medium Yellow Onion

4 cloves Garlic

2 tbl Apple Cider Vinegar

1/2 tsp Salt

1/2 tsp Pepper

Blend this on high until smooth. Add in -

1 cup Nutritional Yeast

Blend on medium or whatever it takes to get the mixture spinning. If you want a creamier texture, add more cashews.

The rest of the milk became smoothies by adding the other 1/2 pkg of spinach and a bunch of different fruits.

Vegan Milk

If the packaged vegan milks don’t work for you:

Soak nuts or seeds overnight (a couple of hours at least). What flavor you desire and what you need to avoid will play a role in your choice of nuts or seeds.

Some seeds have strong flavors, like sunflower seeds. If you wish to tone that down, blend an equal part of sunflower seeds (raw, shelled, unsalted) with something like pumpkin seeds (raw, unsalted).

Cashews and almonds will be on the sweeter side while something like walnuts will have a more earthy flavor. Filberts (hazelnuts) tend towards the bitter end of the flavor spectrum.

Blend 1 cup of water with 1 cup of your chosen seeds or nuts. Add a couple of pitted dates for sweetener and then strain it (nut milk bag or cheesecloth). Be prepared for your fingers to get cold and numb.

There are no preservatives in this so it won't last long - maybe a few days.

For some of these recipes, straining is not necessary as the seeds/nuts will just be part of the flour used.

I generally use unsweetened milks in these recipes as the sugars in other ingredients are enough for me. Sweetened milk is fine to use as well.