Cashew Cream Cheese with Seed Crackers
This cashew creamy cheese is a vegan cream cheese made from cashews, lemon juice and apple cider vinegar. While I have often tried the ‘instant’ version of this make, where all the ingredients are blended and used immediately, this make, over a period of about 36 hours, provides the consistency and taste of dairy cream cheese.
This cheese has various uses as an alternative to dairy cream cheese – spread on crackers, added to pasta and salads, used in desserts and pancakes or as a plain spoonful treat too!
Ingredients
1 ½ cups raw cashews, soaked for 12 hours
2 tblsp raw apple cider vinegar
2 tblsp fresh lemon juice
2-3 tblsp water
Here’s How
- Add the raw cashew nuts to a glass bowl and cover it with bottled water. Cover with a lid or plastic cling wrap and place in the refrigerator, allowing the raw cashews to soak for 12 hours.
- Remove from the refrigerator, drain and rinse the cashews with water.
- Add the cashew nuts to a blender or food processor and add in the remaining ingredients. Begin with 2 tablespoons of water and work up to 3 tablespoons if needed. The water is included to aid the mixture get as smooth as possible in the blender.
- Blend for about 3 minutes, until the cashews form a very smooth paste. Set the cashew paste aside for 2 hours.
- Using a filteration bag or nutbag or cheesecloth, insert your choice of either into a tall glass water jug. To make a thinner, more creamy cream cheese, if using cheesecloth, double up the cloth. To create a firmer cheese, use a single layer
- Spoon the cream cheese mixture into the bag or cloth.
- Pull up the sides and if using a nut bag, tie with the bag string or if using cheesecloth, tie with a piece of string or twine.
- Hang the cheese bag inside a vase or juice/water jug. The bag needs to be suspended in the air to enable the drainage of excess liquid.
- Leave the cashew nut mix in a warm place for at least 24 hours. Thereafter, remove the nutbag from its’ suspended state , scoop out the creamy nut-cheese and serve. You may wish to add flavouring of vanilla extract or vanilla bean scrapings, or dried / fresh herbs, even a bit of date paste or raw honey.
Seed crackers with Cashew Cream Cheese
