Vegan "Mac and Cheese"

This week, I was craving pasta. I mean CRAVING PASTA. Thick gooey creamy no-good-for-you pasta. After digging through a few cook books, and digging through the back of the cabinet, I finally found enough ingredients to make a modified version of mac n' cheese that was the best version of creamy mac and cheese I have ever concocted. This recipe is a modified recipe from one of old stand in Fresh Vegetarian Slow Cooker by Robin Robertson. Another great cookbook that should be in any vegetarian or health conscious person's cookbook library. While the title reads vegetarian, all the recipes can be made vegan by using milk replacer, if it calls for milk. My favorite in-a-recipe milk replacer is Unsweetened Hemp Milk.

Ingredients:

• 8 0z Brown Rice or Whole Wheat Elbows. I use Tinkyada Brown Rice Elbows
• 3/4 cup raw unsalted cashew
• 1 can or 1.5 cups of white beans (I used Great Northern Beans), if canned, drain and rinsed.
• 1 cup of vegatable stock
• 1 cup of water- or enough to blend to liquid
• 1 teaspoon white pepper (white pepper has a somewhat spicier flavor to it and love to use it in certain recipes) , you can use black, but for best flavor use white
• 1/2 white onion
• 5 cloves of garlic
• pinch of ground nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon dry mustard
• 1/2 teaspoon cayenne
• 2 teaspoon lemon juice
• 1/4 cup nutritional yeast (very important, NOT BREWERS YEAST. Nutritional yeast a vegan addititve that has a cheesy flavor to it without any dairy. Usually only found in whole foods, new seasons, and other whole foodsy stores. I get the small flake.)
• 2-3 cups fresh or 1 cup frozen cooked and drained spinach

1. Cook pasta al dente (or barely tender).I used Tinkyada Brown Rice Elbows to make it gluten free.
2. Heat 1 tbsp of high heat oil (like Safflower, Refined Coconut, NOT olive oil) and lightly cook sliced onions and minced garlic until onions are transparent.

3. Place cashews in high powered blender (like Vitamix) or food processor, and pulse into fine powder.

4. Rinse and drain beans and add to blender, along with vegetable stock, lemon juice, and water. Blend to liquid

5. Add onions, garlic, nutmeg, dry mustard cayenne, nutritional yeast, and white pepper to blender, and blend until smooth.

6. Add pasta and sauce to slow cooker. Add in spinach and stir. Pasta should be very easy to stir at this point. If the sauce is too thick, add some water

7. Cook on low for 2-2.5 hours, until sauce is thickened, but not dry. Enjoy :)