tweak and nourish

LINGUINI WITH MUSHROOM CASHEW CREAM SAUCE. You may have noted on my previous post "tweak and nourish" a rare occasion when I ate meat. The Carbonara with pancetta was the only dish we ate for Christmas dinner. That was the only time when we didn't have an array of dishes at the dinner table on Christmas. But it was enough and very satisfying especially with the spinach and mushrooms. I felt less guilty about eating meat with those ingredients added to the dish.

A few weeks after the sumptuous meal, I thought about eating a creamy pasta dish. I wanted it to be a partial guilt-free dish so I decided to cook a vegan sauce for the pasta. It would have been a total guilt-free dish if I used zucchini noodles or veggie spirals.

In a blender, I pulsed soak cashews, nutritional yeast, lemon juice, miso paste, garlic powder, homemade veggie broth, salt, and pepper. Those are my basic ingredients. After mixing all the ingredients, I asked my husband to taste it. He did, and muttered "hmmmm". He kept going back and forth to the pantry where we keep the spices. He kept adding spices to the mixture. In the end, he made me taste the mixture and I was blown away! He added dried basil, onion powder, dried oregano, dried thyme, and fennel seeds. I couldn't believe a healthy creamy pasta sauce can taste so good.

After the pasta was cooked, I sautéed mushrooms in a large pan. Then, I added the mixture and a little bit of pasta water. I wasn't able to take a photo of my plate but here is my husband's plate: he added chicken!

Cashew Cream Sauce:

nutritional yeast, soaked cashews, lemon juice

onion powder, garlic powder, veggie broth

dried basil, dried oregano, dried thyme

fennel seeds, miso paste, ground black pepper

salt.