Smoky Spicy Cheese Sauce. Vegan. Gluten Free.

Smoky.  Spicy. Cheesy Sauce.  Wait… dip.  Dressing!  Wait… a sub for yogurt or mayo in sandwiches!  Oh the uses are endless!  And the spiciness and smokiness is all under your wielding. But for us… the more kick and the smokier the better!

This cheese sauce, dip, dressing – whatever you want to call it is totally vegan and gluten free.  You will be bulled over by the flavor this packs in this super simple, insane concoction!  Seriously… you won’t want to miss this one.  Prep is required with the cashews but other than that -soaked cashews made into cream can become a magical ingredient that vegans seriously rejoice over!  I normally go sweeter but do love a savory cashew cream. And please, anything with Sriracha is just hands down fabulous.  I think I may need a support group for hot sauce.  In fact – there are two different types in here. Okay… recipe time.

UPDATE:  I made a super yummy vegan chili tonight and put a doll-up of this on it… heavenly!  Another use for this awesome sauce. Ha ha.

Ingredients:

1 cup of soaked cashews (take one cup of raw cashews and cover with water and refrigerate overnight), drained and rinsed
2 tablespoons of Sriracha sauce
2 tablespoons of Chipotle Hot Sauce
1 cup of water
1/4 cup of nutritional yeast
1/2 of a lime squeezed for juice
1 teaspoon chili powder
1-2 teaspoons of smoked paprika (depending on your taste)
1/2-1 teaspoon of salt

Directions:

Place all of the ingredients into your Vitamix or blender and blend until smooth and creamy.  Adjust the seasonings per your preference.  Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 7 days.  Enjoy dipping veggies/chips, toss with pasta, replace mayo and use as a replacement, sauce replacement for pizza, bread dip… endless ideas.  Enjoy!

Cashews blow up once soaked and softens them a great deal.  Super easy to blend down into a cream sauce.

If you follow me on IG, you know I finally had the pins out of my finger. Sadly, the process was what I’ve dubbed a “murder-like” scene.  Sorry for that.  The doc requested that I take Tuesday – Friday off to recover and let my body fight the pin rejection with some antibiotics and sleep.  I did that.  I slept… man did I sleep!  I was sleeping 9-10 hours a day. Wait.  WHAT?  Yep. Seriously.  I never thought that was possible so I guess this body needed that.  As much as my finger feels SO MUCH BETTER, it still hurts from the removal process.  I also have to stay in a cast for the foreseeable future.  Fun!  So with my fun doc visit yesterday, I was given a green light to run (cautiously) and weightlift 2x a week.  I’ll take it.

Today (Saturday when I wrote up this post) it rained.  Really, it poured.  I had new Mizuno Wave Rider 18’s to test out.  Nothing was going to stop me.  So to the gym I dragged ummm- I mean coerced my husband to join me.  I RAN!  It was tiring at first then it kicked in… I felt so good.  I ran 5.19 miles at 7:53!  WOOOO HOOOO!  I’ve been dragging for such a long time.  7’s… felt good!  I realize it may have been a fluke but it felt damn good.  The sneakers – yeah. The bomb!  Insane.  Awesome.  Love Mizuno. End of Story!

Action shot thanks to Bill.

And hey… to run next to this guy on a Saturday for our weekend morning date… be still my heart!

Okay so it’s Monday. We have devoured this dip/sauce- whatever you want to call it all weekend in various ways. Seriously insane.  Must try!  Highly recommend.

Happy day to you all!  oxo

 

— Knead to Cook