Learn how to make the most delicious 20 Minute Easy Vegan Dairy-free Alfredo that will blow away all your guests, shock them that it is dairy-free and healthy! Rich, creamy, decadent and just 7 ingredients and without any butter or oil!
EASY DAIRY-FREE ALFREDO
Sometimes the most amazing vegan recipes happen as the result of impromptu recipes. This recipe is one of those times. I was planning on making my Best Vegan Garlic Alfredo for dinner one night, but realized I was too low on cashews (gasp!) and out of lemon juice. So, I decided to just throw together some ingredients and wing it with what I had and holy moly, this one turned out just as rich and so amazing. I double dare you to make this for somebody (don’t tell them it’s not full of butter or cream) and tell me they don’t love it. While I love my original (it’s the most popular recipe on the blog).
HOW TO MAKE DAIRY-FREE ALFREDO
First you need to gather the ingredients to make this vegan alfredo:
- raw cashew butter (I make my own here since store-bought tends to be roasted and with added oil, which will not work well)
- vegetable broth
- brown rice flour
- apple cider vinegar
- some dried Italian herbs
- garlic powder
- nutritional yeast
It’s quite different than my original, which uses a lot of cooked onions and garlic, this one does not. But this one with the rice flour makes it so creamy. My husband scarfed it down SO fast and said “this is the best you’ve ever made”. We both debated on me calling it “Restaurant Style Alfredo”. It is just that good.
You will start out by adding the cashew butter, brown rice flour, apple cider vinegar, Italian herbs, nutritional yeast, salt and just blend them up in your blender. I used my Vitamix.
Add them to a pan and it will be very thin (like water), as in the above picture, but after just a few minutes of cooking, it will turn out creamy and fabulous like this.
I’m not kidding that this dairy-free alfredo sauce comes together in 20 minutes. It took exactly 19 minutes to do the pasta from start to finish and only 12-15 minutes for the sauce. You won’t find a more easy vegan alfredo!
This is also perfect for all of you that don’t have high powered blenders needed for raw cashews in so many sauces.
This healthy dairy-free alfredo sauce is so healthy, gluten-free and 100% oil-free. It is also just 8 ingredients (+salt).
MORE VEGAN CREAMY SAUCES
- Vegan White Wine Sauce
- Vegan Lemon Florentine Pasta
- Vegan Pimento Cream Sauce
- Vegan Lemon, Garlic & Thyme Sauce
If you make this recipe, be sure to leave feedback below and share your pic on Instagram or Facebook and tag me @thevegan8 #thevegan8!
Easy Dairy-free Alfredo
Ingredients
FOR THE PASTA
- 14 oz bag pasta of choice
- 1/2 tablespoon salt
ALFREDO SAUCE
- 2 cups (480g) well-flavored low-sodium vegetable broth (SEE NOTE)
- 1/4 cup (64g) RAW cashew butter with NO added oils or salt (I make my own here because it's practically impossible to find a raw oil-free cashew butter in stores.)
- 1-2 teaspoons (5-10g) apple cider vinegar (I find this can really vary depending on brand of broth used, start with none or 1 teaspoon at first.)
- 2 tablespoons (16g) nutritional yeast (Highly recommend the unfortified Sari brand-no weird vitamin taste)
- 2 tablespoons (20g) brown rice flour
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 teaspoon fine sea salt
- 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
- 1 teaspoon Italian seasoning
- optional: any veggies you may want to add
NOTE
- If you would like to use raw cashews (instead of cashew butter) you will just use the same weight amount, which is about a scant 1/2 cup. If you don't have a high-powered blender, then you must soak them overnight in a bowl of water, drain and rinse. Otherwise, your result will be gritty and NOT creamy. A food processor usually works better with soaked cashews versus a blender that isn't very powerful.
UPDATE
- I highly recommend the low-sodium veggie broth by Trader Joe's, if possible or the Pacific brand. Both are so flavorful. If not using nutritional yeast, slightly increase the garlic powder and add a teaspoon of onion powder.
Instructions
- Follow each step closely to have this ready in 20 minutes. You will first need to start your pasta before the sauce. Add 12 cups of very hot water to a large pot and put the lid on (it will come to a boil faster). Turn to high heat and let it come to a boil. Mine took about 10 minutes before it was boiling (yours may be faster). Once it's boiling add the pasta and salt and quickly stir it around to loosen it up. The salt is important because it flavors the pasta. Cook for 9 minutes or until al dente. Yours will vary depending on the pasta used.
- While waiting on the water to boil, add all the "alfredo sauce" ingredients to a blender, starting with just 1 teaspoon of the vinegar. Broth brands greatly vary in flavor and I find depending on the brand used, I may need NO vinegar or only 1 teaspoon. Blend, then taste and decide. Blend until very smooth. It will be very runny, don't worry as it will thicken up a lot when cooking.
- Check your water to see if boiling yet.
- Add the sauce to a large pan over high heat. Once it starts bubbling all over, immediately turn to medium-low heat and whisk continually while letting it cook 3-4 minutes until thickened. You want to continually whisk around the bottom and sides, so the flour doesn't clump. Don't walk away from it! You don't want to overcook because it will thicken up a lot as it cools. Add any veggies if you like. I sometimes add peas and carrots from the freezer and let them cook a minute in the sauce.
- Once the pasta is done, drain and rinse with water to stop the cooking. Brown rice pasta can stick really badly, so I rinse really well and serve immediately. If using regular gluten pasta, you don't need to rinse it. Add to a plate, then add the sauce and garnish with extra dried Italian herbs or red pepper flakes or anything else you like.
Low on ingredients was how I first tried your recipe.
first, I’m accustomed to using my K-tec blender to make a vegan cheese sauce for mac and cheese. so I did some adapting.
I did use a half a cup of raw cashews.
for some odd reason I don’t have apple cider vinegar so used white instead.
I ended up having to use chicken broth because I didn’t have vegetable.
thankfully you have a very versatile recipe here. I put hot water, bouillon and everything else in my blender and rather than use the brown rice flour that I also didn’t have, I used a heaping tablespoon of cornstarch. the blender gets it hot enough that the cornstarch will thicken.
I found no reason, because I make the cheese sauce all the time with cashews, to bring it down to a cashew butter first, because the blender does that superbly. I was excited to see Barbara’s comment as I was scrolling to leave you a comment about using the blender. 🙂
it was so good, that I had to make another batch this morning just to have some on hand, and spoon some over my eggs 🙂
Haha, making it again for breakfast because it’s so good sounds like a fabulous idea!! So glad you loved this!! Yes, the cashews work very closely to the cashew butter. I did make this with whole cashews and of course was delicious, but something magical about the butter because it releases the natural oils and somehow becomes creamier and richer. But so glad you made it work and loved it, thank you so much for the feedback!
This is the best Alfredo sauce I have made so far…and I have tried several bcs I love Alfredo sauce! My kid that’s very picky rate it 100! Thanks for another amazing recipe!
That is awesome, thank you so much Silvana! I’m so happy to hear this is the best you’ve ever had, thank you for the awesome feedback!
I love those happy … accidents? recipes on the fly, that sounds better. I LOVE Alfredo (and Bechamel!), seriously craving it now!
Thank you Kristina! I wish all recipes came this easily, haha!
Can you believe I never made an Alfredo Pasta? I copy pasted this one to my notes, because I feel I’m missing out big time!!
This looks _amazing_ and so dooable. My vegan alfredo is pretty stodgy, and yours looks so light and creamy, yum! I’m excited to make this. I also like your idea of using apple cider vinegar instead of lemon juice, I’d like to try that in some of my other recipes.
As if you could have made your original alfredo sauce any better! I’ll have to try this one out too and see which one my family prefers. We still eat your other alfredo at least every two weeks 🙂
Love it when fabulous recipes are born out of just winging it! I have made a vegan alfredo sauce using pureed cauliflower but would love to try this version!! YUM!
Oh yes, I’ve seen a ton of those cauliflower ones! This is a much more traditional type of alfredo, more richer and creamy b/c of the cashew butter and rice flour, but the cauliflower ones look fabulous too for a lighter version!
Why would anyone eat fattening dairy Alfredo when there are so many awesome vegan versions? Love this recipe, Brandi! Thanks for sharing.
Agreed Linda! And this is the BEST one I’ve ever had, dairy, vegan or not! We eat it 3+ times each week now, haha!
This was so totally awesome and DElish! It’s the first of your recipes that I’ve ever tried. I L.O.V.E., love this recipe. Thinking about all the other possible uses for it. What do you think about adding chopped spinach or other vegetables and assembling a GF vegan lasagna with it?! Glad I stumbled upon you. ?
Wonderful! I’m so happy to hear you loved this so much! Thank you so much for the wonderful feedback! The lasagna sounds amazing! This sauce is truly so versatile!! I add different veggies all the time to the sauce!
So, I was a little confused as to why you would come up with another Alfredo recipe when your first one is absolutely mind blowing… And then I made it. Soooo easy! Sooooo delicious! We now have two incredibly “rich” Alfredo sauces to choose from. Thank you, Brandi!
I will say we ran out of nutritional yeast and I did not have plain rice flour. However I love to play around with recipes, and ended up using an all purpose blended gluten-free flour ( which did have rice flour in it ), and it did a great job thickening the sauce. In leiu of the missing yeast, I added some extra garlic and onion powder and some brown mustard. YUM! This sauce was amazing on gluten-free pasta, as well as spaghetti squash and sautéed veggies .
Thank you for this versatile, creamy, decadent recipe! (PS- totally enjoyed making my own raw cashew butter. I saved some to try your mug toffee recipe next. 🙂
https://thevegan8.com/?s=Toffee
I’m so happy to hear you loved this one so much as well Colleen! Yes, 2 alfredos is a good thing, haha! I love this one slightly more because it’s just extra creamy and different, but love them both! So glad to hear how much you enjoyed it, thank you so much Colleen!
Oh and I can’t wait to hear what you think of the toffee mug cake!!
That’s good to know because I can’t have Nutritional yeast as it hurts my tummy.
When I saw this recipe on your feed I was so excited to get home and try it. We just made it and it surpassed my expectations! I thought the use of cashew butter was genius! The recipe is perfect and turned out better than I hoped. My husband and I ate it all in one sitting! We are so full but couldn’t resist how yummy it was. Vegan comfort food at its finest. You go girl! Great recipe!
Wonderful Christa! Thank you so much for making it and leaving feedback! I’m so happy it surpassed your expectations, great news! Thanks again for letting me know!
Cashew butter rules! I use it a ton in baking, and it makes total sense here, too, since I generally use blended cashews for creamy sauces. I like the ease of just using the butter though….super smart. Looks delicious!
Thank you! I use it in a lot of my desserts too! It is completely different than my original alfredo, and it’s not just the cashew butter because otherwise, that is similar to using cashews, what made this SO different than my original is the process of how I cooked it and using the brown rice flour and cooking it after blending. It made it so much more creamy! I was amazed, lol!
I feel like I have not visited you in forever and I feel like I terrible blogging friend! I have to do some catch up, ASAP!
Heyyy girl!! I’m just as terrible, I need to stop by your blog as well! I’ve become so busy, that I’ve struggled to keep up with blogs lately! Thank you for checking in! 🙂
Such a beautiful recipe, Brandi! Love it. And you know I LOVE cashew butter, so any excuse to use it more is always welcome 🙂 Can’t wait to try this!
Thank you so much Audrey! Can’t wait to hear what you think!
Holy Moly, Brandi!!! This was so delicious! My whole family gobbled it up and asked for seconds and there were none. So, we had to settle for some garlic toast on the side. I agree w/the above comment that it would make a good gravy w/some thyme and sage added. So many uses for this little sauce. I added peas and carrots, also, and I appreciate that it hardly took any time at all to make. I will definitely make this again!
Yay!! So happy to hear you all loved it so much Lisa! We are seriously obsessed with it here too!! Thank you so much for leaving feedback and yes, thyme would be excellent in this! I use fresh thyme in my Cabernet gravy, you should try that one, and I bet it would be sooo delicious in this alfredo too. Thanks again!
I am not the same Christina that commented above. Hahaha I just want to say that the vegan community is so lucky to have you. You make delicious healthy recipes that would make it easy for anyone to be vegan and to love the food they are eating. I am so glad you share your recipes. I do try to keep my nut intake to a bare minimum and I can’t eat cashews, so I am excited to see your comment above that you are working on a nut free version of this. I can’t wait for that. Even though I myself can’t eat this recipe it still looks insanely good and I love looking at the pic of the plate of pasta on your instagram, and on here of course, seriously drool worth.
*worthy. Hahaha forgot the y there. 🙂
Christina, what a kind gem you are to me! You really are so sweet. Thank you for your kind words, I can’t tell you how much I appreciate you leaving your thoughts here! So bummed that you can’t have nuts, but I promise I will work really hard at getting one after Thanksgiving passes…a bit crazy at the moment, but will get it done. Thank you again so much!
You are certainly welcome brandi. I just express my honest feelings. Seriously I am grateful for your recipes. Even if I can’t eat some I can still make them for other people whenever I get that chance. It is always fun to feed people amazing vegan food. I can eat most nuts just not almonds and cashews. The others nuts I will eat on occasion but I try not to eat them daily or even weekly because I don’t digest them that well but I will eat them on occasion in small amounts in recipes and stuff. 🙂
Made this tonight and it was delicious! So creamy, you would never guess the ingredients. I can’t wait to make it again to share 🙂
Willow and I made this last night for dinner and it was SOOOOO good!!! I thought I had brown rice flour, but apparently ran out during recipe trials, so I had to settle for some sweet rice flour. It was super cream and thick (maybe a bit glue-y) so I’ll definitely make it again once I pick up brown rice flour. You know what my initial thought was when I tried some of the sauce on its own? It would make an excellent gravy if you added a bunch of sage….I’m thinking biscuits and gravy or just poured over mashed potatoes! what it comes down to is that this sauce is excellent and toddler approved, so it’s a winner in our house!!
Thank you so much Mandy! I’m so happy to hear everybody loved this! Makes me happy! And yes girl, get the brown rice flour for next time, it is significantly different in the texture. You’ll notice a difference. The brown rice flour just acts like a regular thickener and makes it super creamy, whereas sticky sweet rice flour definitely is 10 times stronger and gluey. Thanks so much for making it, you are the best! 🙂 Oh, and yes, about the gravy, I use brown rice flour for my Thyme Cabernet gravy and also my Teriyaki sauce, it is my favorite thickener to use! Haha! 🙂
I tried this today and it’s delightful. The sauce is light and creamy, i fell in love from the first bite. This will replace my other dairy Alfredo sauces for sure.
Thanks for a simple delicious recipe!
Yay! So glad to hear that Shekinah, thank you so much for leaving such wonderful feedback!
WOW!!! This sauce is magical! I, never in a million years, would have come up with this combo – cashew butter and brown rice flour?! Tomorrow is pasta night in our house and I just might have to make this sauce instead! The funny thing is that I very rarely have lemons in the house, so I always sub ACV when lemon juice is called for! ha! I don’t have cashew butter on hand, but I do have raw cashews, so I’ll make my own. This looks out of this world creamy and those close up shots make me want to hop in the kitchen and make it now! Looks amazing, friend!
I’m going to try this and add mushrooms. ..
Are there any substitutes for cashew butter? My daughter is deathly allergic to cashews. Thanks!
Hi there! I have only tested this with cashew butter, so I have no idea how well it would taste, but my only suggestion would be macadamia nut butter (raw) because it has the closest taste to a cashew and texture. Let me know if you try it!
Had this tonight –easy and creamy–soooo good! You are a wonder my dear ??
Aww thanks so much Julie! So happy to hear you loved it!
This tasted delicious!! Love it! Thanks for posting it.
Thank you so much Valerie, I’m so glad to hear!!
I made this a couple of nights ago and used it to make a vegetable pot pie that was out of this world. Threw in some mushrooms, asparagus, various left over mixed veggies, mixed it all up, baked it and Wow was the only thing I could say. Unfortunately, I didn’t think to grab a picture and it never made it to left overs. I could have taken an picture of the empty pie pan but again, not quite the same. 🙂
Such an amazing idea, thank you so much for sharing Mike! I absolutely love your idea and need to try it!!