Vegan cashew cheese that is sliceable and perfect for a vegan cheese board! Full flavored, authentic looking and quick and easy to make too!
Hard, sliceable cashew cheese. It’s here! And I couldn’t be more excited!
We have guests coming next week and I have a full on cheese board planned, with this as the main event!
I have to admit it took me a fair few goes to get this one right. If you follow us on instagram then you might have seen in our instastories where I was proudly showing off each new attempt.
From the start though I was delighted with this.
To think it can be so easy to make a super impressive block of vegan cheese!
And it is simply fabulous! You can slice it into perfect slices and put them on crackers or bread or wherever you would eat a slice of cheese.
And you can mash it up too. It’s sliceable and hard enough to cut perfect slices, but you can also still smash it on a cracker if you want to.
If you love making your own homemade vegan cheese then also check out our vegan brie, vegan camembert and vegan blue cheese.
How To Make Cashew Cheese
I started off with just a basic recipe and then quickly saw that I needed to add more cashews to make it really rich and lots more spices to make that cheese flavor really stand out.
Some recipes recommend you cook it all up with the agar agar powder (which is what makes it set) on the stove and then pour it out into your dish to set, but this doesn’t work at all when you use more cashews to make a thicker/more robust cheese, because then it’s too thick to stir up properly with the agar agar.
And since the agar agar needs to boil for at least a minute for that agar powder to set up properly I found it a much better plan to do it separately.
So basically, you make up a batch of cashew cheese sauce in the blender, but you spice it up more strongly than you would usually, to the point that if you taste it, you’ll be thinking: this is too strong!
But then you boil up a cup of water with agar agar powder on the stove, let that boil for a minute and then pour that mix into your cashew cheese sauce (conveniently still in the blender) blend it up again and then pour it all out into your dish to set.
The water and agar powder dilute the spiciness of the cheese and while setting it also dilutes it a bit so you have to start off strong to end up with perfectly spiced cashew cheese.
A Vegan Cheese Board
It’s perfect for a vegan cheese board with some red grapes, jams, maybe some mixed salted nuts and a selection of crackers (and maybe some wine too).
And let me just say, a slice of this on a cracker with some mixed fruit jam on top – but any jam would be awesome – was like the best thing ever. Jaye and I were in heaven. And we can’t wait to show it off to our guests next week.
Ingredient Notes
The Cashews:
This recipe is quick and easy and one of the things that makes it so quick is that you don’t need to soak the cashews first. You can just go right in and blend them up.
The reason it’s possible to do this is because you’re making a sauce to start off with, it’s not a super thick cheese right off the bat so it’s more easily blendable (I do have a vitamix though so that helps!).
Provided your blender is strong enough I don’t really see any reason to soak them first in this recipe but I am not an expert on your blender. If you know your blender will have trouble with this, then you can soak them briefly in boiling water. Just place the nuts into a bowl, pour boiling water over the top and then leave them to soak for 15 minutes, then drain and use as normal.
The Agar Agar:
The crucial ingredient in this recipe is the agar agar powder. It is what makes the cheese set.
You get two types of agar agar, you get the powder version and the flakes. Use agar agar powder. The agar agar powder is much stronger than the flakes and is what we used in this recipe.
If you have no other option but to use flakes, then you will have to use 3 times as much of it.
Cashew Cheese Q&A
Can you grate it? This cheese can also be grated, the firmer it is the easier it will grate, and the longer it’s in the fridge the firmer it gets, so if it’s not ideally firm for grating on the first day it will likely be grate-able by the second day.
Does it melt? I put a slice on a cracker and put it in the microwave for 15-seconds to see if it melted and it did! So it does melt.
Can you put it on pizza? We tried it on pizza. And it was very tasty and it melted! But let me be clear, when I say ‘melted’ I do NOT mean that it spreads like dairy cheese. No it definitely doesn’t. It softens though and gets melty.
We tried it grated on pizza and sliced, and either way was fantastic. We put it on the pizza before going in the oven, so it melted along with everything else, and it was really good.
Storing and Freezing
Keep it stored in the fridge (covered) where it will last up to a week.
It’s also freezer friendly for up to 3 months. Thaw it in the fridge.
More Delicious Vegan Cheese Recipes
- Since this recipe was published, we’ve made another firm sliceable cheese, a delicious vegan cheddar cheese, so you definitely want to check that out.
- We also have a totally divine vegan cream cheese that is everything you want spread on your breads and bagels! Also check out our vegan cottage cheese and vegan feta.
- Our cashew cheese sauce is perfect drizzled over pizza or baked potatoes and our vegan parmesan cheese is wonderful sprinkled over anything and everything.
- Our vegan mozzarella is divine on some pizza and our vegan nacho cheese is divine on… you guessed it, some vegan nachos!
- And then there’s our vegan ricotta which is incredible just as is, but can also be baked into a vegan lasagna recipe or some vegan stuffed shells!
Did you make this recipe? Be sure to leave a comment and rating below!
Hard Sliceable Cashew Cheese
Ingredients
- 1 cup Raw Cashews (150g)
- ⅓ cup Water (80ml)
- 5 Tbsp Lemon Juice Freshly Squeezed
- 2 Tbsp Coconut Oil
- ¼ cup Tahini (60g)
- ½ Medium Raw Carrot (~30g) peeled and sliced
- 2 ½ tsp Salt
- ¼ tsp Paprika
- ⅛ tsp Cayenne Pepper
- 1 Tbsp Dijon Mustard
- ¼ cup Nutritional Yeast
- 1 tsp Garlic Powder or flakes
- 1 cup Water (240ml)
- 1 Tbsp Agar Agar Powder must be powder and not flakes*
Instructions
- Add the cashews, ⅓ cup water, lemon juice, coconut oil, tahini, carrot, salt, paprika, cayenne, dijon mustard, nutritional yeast and garlic powder to the blender and blend until very smooth. Leave the mix in the blender and set aside.
- Add 1 cup of water and the agar agar powder to a saucepan and heat, stirring regularly until boiling. Boil it for 1 minute (time it), stirring regularly and after 1 minute remove it from the heat and pour it into the blender on top of the cheese mix.
- Blend until smooth.
- Moving quickly, as it will start setting up very fast, pour the mix out into a round dish sprayed with non-stick spray.
- Refrigerate until set. To remove from the bowl, turn upside down onto a plate.
Video
Notes
- It is crucial for the success of this recipe that you use agar agar powder and not flakes. Flakes are much less powerful and if you DO use flakes you will need to use 3 times as much (3 tablespoons).
- This might seem like a lot of salt, but it works perfectly in this recipe.
- I used a regular round bowl, it was 5 inches round and 2 inches deep. I chose it because it was quite straight up the sides so created a nicer shape for the cheese. But you can really use any bowl or ramekin, and if your bowls are smaller, then just use 2 bowls for 2 smaller blocks of cheese.
- This cheese can be grated but it tends to get firmer the longer it’s in the fridge. So it’s better for grating on the second day than on the day it’s made.
- It does also melt. We put a slice on a cracker and put it in the microwave for 15 seconds and it melted. So yes it does melt!
- We have also tried it on pizza. We tried it grated onto a pizza and sliced. Either way was great. We put it on with all our other toppings before going into the oven and it got nice and soft and melty along with the other toppings. It doesn’t spread or anything, but it’s very good.
- This recipe makes one 21 ounce (600g) round of vegan cheese.
- Serving size is 4 slices which is approximately 1 ounce.
great recipe! how do i sign up to receive the daily recipes? thank you.
Hi Tanya! Thank you for your review! You can scroll up to the post and you will find under the “how to make cashew cheese” heading is a box where you can subscribe to our email list. 🙂
Thanks for the recipe. I have a question and also some tips
The question – how were the holes in the cheese made?
The tips-
*fermentation
To get the taste of cheese, you should ferment the ground cashews with vegan probiotics.
(I recommend 50 billion CFU)
Grind only the cashews with half a cup of vegetable milk (preferably coconut cream that mimics the taste of lactose)
At this stage I recommend adding a tablespoon of potato starch.
When the cashews, starch and cream are ground into a smooth cream, probiotics are added – It’s time to ferment it in a warm place for at least 12 hours.
It is advisable to ferment in an electric pot at 40C, but if you don’t have one, then put in a dish wrapped with a towel in an oven heated to 100C, turn it off and leave only light in it.
When the cashew cream smells like cheese and tastes sour, it is a sign that lactic bacteria have developed, which are responsible for the taste of the cheese.
Return the batter to the blender.
*Seasoning
Since the cheese has already soured, you can reduce the lemon juice and since it has a real cheese flavor, you don’t need nutritional yeast. For an umami taste, I recommend half a teaspoon of light miso (shiro)
Mix well in a blender to a smooth cream with the rest of the spices (salt, garlic, white pepper, etc.)
Don’t forget the coconut oil.
*stretching and melting effect
When the cheese is in the blender, add a teaspoon and a half of psyllium powder. Do not mix the psyllium yet. wait for the agar.
*dishes
At this stage it is important to prepare the dish in which we will stabilize the cheese. If it’s silicone made, it does not need oiling, every other dish should be oiled with a thin layer of oil.
*Agar agar-
There are different qualities of Agar that are marked by numbers. Most of the agar sold in health stores has a medium or lower level..
In addition, agar coagulates less in an acidic medium. So in my opinion you need at least a tablespoon and a half of agar per 3/4 cup of water.
cook well, (boil, reduce heat and cook for another 5 minutes on very low heat while stirring)
When the agar is ready, add it to the blender and then mix on high power for a minute.
The cheese will start to thicken, so you have to hurry and pour it into the dish we prepared in advance.
I hope these tips help anyone who has complained that the cheese doesn’t melt or it doesn’t sliced and most of all it doesn’t taste like cheese.
Good Luck
This changed my life for the better. It’s so delicious & creamy. My dad (who was raised on a dairy farm & grew up eating cheese) was sad one day when he came to dinner and I had not made this cheese. From now on, I make it for him, for every special occasion. Thank you so much!!!
That’s awesome Kimberley! Thanks so much for your great review!
Fantastic flavor and texture!
Thank you Elena!
Very tasty but definitely not sliceable.
How long will it keep? Could i freeze it?
Hi Renee. Up to a week covered in the fridge and yes, you can freeze it. You can find more info in the post above under storing and freezing.
I’ve made this a few time and really like it but it is never ever hard enough to grate…. why do you think that maybe and leaving longer in the fridge doesn’t work to make it grateable well not for me.
Hello,
your recipe looks delicious and I cannot wait to try it! Did you soften the cashews first in 1/3 cup of hot water or grind them raw?
Hi Maria, you don’t need to soak the cashews first. 🙂
Has anyone found a substitute for coconut oil? I’m allergic
This is quite surprising and very good. The cheese slices nicely, stays firm, but also softens when heated. Does it taste like “real” cheese? Not really, but most vegans get past that with foods anyway. Gather all the ingredients first, have everything ready then bingo! It all comes together. Thanks for the recipe and the research that went into it.
Thanks so much for sharing and for your great review Rosie!
I followed the recipe exactly and it worked but 2 notes. #1 – it does not taste like real cheese. It tastes like nutritional yeast. #2 – it does not melt. I slice it and put it in the microwave and it stays solid.
I’ve just made it today. Very easy. and very tasty!
Thank you! 🙂
Hello,
I am interested in making this cheese but I am unable to acquire agar agar powder. Can I use arrowroot flour instead? If so, in what ratio and do I have to cook it first?
Hi Gilli, unfortunately we’ve only tested this with agar agar, so I won’t be able to say.