Merry Christmas & Cranberry Fluff

 Hope you are all having a wonderful Christmas with a house full of family, friends, and love, enjoy the holiday's!

There is nothing like Grandma's famous cranberry fluff that my aunt makes every year, however I don't eat the usual ingredients of cool whip or marshmallows, so what's a girl to do? Veganize it! So I did, it was delicious and tastes almost just like her yummy recipe I grew up eating :) Hope you enjoy it too!

Makes about 4-5 cups

1/2lb package whole cranberries, or 1 can organic jellied cranberries with cranberry pieces
1 1/2 cups pineapple, or 1 can pineapple chunks, drained (slice if you want them smaller)
1 15oz can organic coconut milk *
1/2 cup vegan powdered sugar, or to taste *
1oz chopped walnuts
2 cups vegan marshmallows (optional)

-First put your can of coconut milk into the fridge overnight, no need to shake or anything else.

-Carefully open your can of coconut milk and scoop out the thick white part into a 1 quart size mixing bowl, it ends up being about 1/2-3/4 of the can, try not to get too much of the more liquid part.

-Use a hand mixer to mix the powdered sugar into the coconut milk until you get stiff peaks like thick cool whip.

- For your cranberries you can grind the whole cranberries into small pieces using a food processor, blender, or if you happened to have a meat grinder :/ that works well.

-Fold all the ingredients together and chill until served.

*UPDATE: since posting this recipe they have come out with vegan "Cool Whip" and other non-dairy alternatives, so if you want you could just substitute the coconut milk and powdered sugar with one of these. My favorite that is pretty easy to find is Coco Whip.

The Best Vegan Cheese Sauce

  This is without a doubt the best nacho type cheese sauce you will ever taste, I served this with pasta, broccoli, asparagus, and with corn chips, or top your baked potato with it. I promise anyone that eats this will love it and want the recipe. The first time I tried a fake cheese with nutritional yeast I didn't like it, I am willing to try nutritional yeast again but I was happy to find a "cheese" sauce without it.

  
   This is originally from VegNews vegan mac & cheese recipe , I changed some of the quantities to fit our tastes at home and thought since I'm always sending people the link to that recipe and then telling them about my changes it might be easier to just post it with the adjustments. But all the credit goes to the original recipe, it's so delicious and so simple to make, I know you'll love it! I promise to get a picture up of it soon, as I'm sure we will be making it again as soon as we can ;)


1 cup red or yellow potatoes, peeled and chopped
1/4 cup carrots, peeled and chopped
1/3 cup onion, peeled and chopped
1 cup water, or just enough to cover
1/4 cup raw cashews (soak 4-6 hrs if you can)
1 tsp sea salt
1/4 tsp garlic, minced (or garlic powder)
1/4 tsp and a tiny dab extra of Dijon mustard
1 tbs lemon juice, freshly squeezed
1/4 tsp black pepper
Pinch of cayenne (add an extra pinch if you want it to have an extra spicy kick)

-Place your potatoes, carrots, onion, and water in sauce pan, bring to a boil, cover and lower heat, simmer about 15 mins or until tender.

-While that is cooking, add the rest of the ingredients to your blender, when the vegetables are done add some of the cooking water to the ingredients in the blender and process until smooth (doesn't matter how much just enough to get things moving). Add the rest of the cooking water and veggies to the blender and process again until smooth.

* The original recipe included more salt, margarine, less dijon, and more cayenne.