Vegan Nacho Cheese Sauce

This vegan nacho cheese is creamy, rich, and packed with flavor without using any nuts. It is better than store-bought processed versions and is incredibly easy to make. Plus, you can have this budget-friendly sauce ready from scratch in just 20 minutes!

Course Appetizer, Sauce, Side Dish

Cuisine American, Dairy-free, Egg-free, Gluten-free, Nut-free, Soy-free, Vegan, Vegetarian

Keyword dairy-free nacho cheese sauce, nut-free nacho cheese sauce, vegan nacho cheese sauce

Prep Time 10

Cook Time 10

Total Time 20

Servings cups

Calories 109kcal

Author Nandor Barta

Equipment

Ingredients

To pre-cook

1 cup Potato (diced) 1 medium
1 cup Sweet potato (diced) 1 small/medium
½ cup Carrot (diced) 1 medium
¼ cup Onion (chopped) ½ small
1 clove Garlic
3 cup Veggie broth

To blend

1 cup Veggie broth aka cooking water
⅓ cup Sunflower seed (raw, unsalted)
2 Tbsp Nutritional yeast
1 Tbsp Corn starch
1 Tbsp Lemon juice (freshly squeezed)
½ tsp Hot chili powder or flakes
½ tsp Sweet smoked paprika powder
½ tsp Salt
⅛ tsp Pepper
½ tsp Sriracha (or any other chili paste) optional depending on how hot you like your cheese sauce

US Customary - Metric

Instructions

Prepare ingredients

Peel and dice potatoes, sweet potatoes, and carrots. The smaller you dice them, the shorter will be the cooking time.
Peel and chop onion and garlic.

Pre-cook ingredients

Boil veggie broth in a pan and add all vegetables (diced potatoes, diced sweet potatoes, carrots, chopped onion, and garlic). Cook them until soft.
When ready, reserve 1 cup of cooking water.

Blend everything to make a sauce

Transfer all cooked vegetables into a blender. Add sunflower seeds (no need to soak them), nutritional yeast, lemon juice, spices, corn starch, and the reserved cooking water.
Blend them until you have a creamy sauce.

Video

Notes

A quick tip: Sauces with added flour and starch must be hot to thicken. It means you have to reheat the sauce in a small pan to activate the flour or the starch properly. Especially if your veggies got cold before blending. The veggies also have starch in them, so the sauce may be thick enough without adding anything else.

Nutrition