Do you love thai food and mac & cheese... of course you do! And I don't think you've had enough hot for food mac & cheese. That is the truth! That's why I'm sharing this vegan thai red curry mac & cheese recipe with you. I've taken the bacon mac & cheese recipe from my new cookbook, Vegan Comfort Classics: 101 Recipes to Feed Your Face, and did a little makeover on it to make 2 new tasty versions. This one includes those thai ingredients you love like crushed peanuts, curry paste and tasty "chicken" pieces! The second recipe is for pizza mac & cheese, and you can get the recipe for that here.
Watch the video below to see how easily this vegan thai red curry mac & cheese comes together!
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vegan thai red curry mac & cheese
Ingredients
Pasta & Mix ‘ins
- 3 C elbow macaroni
- 2 pkgs vegan chicken pieces (340 g or approx. 2 cups)
- 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
- sea salt and ground black pepper, to taste
- 2 C baby spinach
- ½ C chopped fresh cilantro
- 2 tablespoon roughly chopped thai basil (optional if you can find it)
Topping
- ¼ C bread crumbs
- ¼ C roasted peanuts, finely chopped or crushed
- 2 tablespoon nutritional yeast
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 teaspoon chili powder
- 1 teaspoon sea salt
Cheese Sauce
- 1 C raw cashews (soaked for 20 minutes in hot water)
- 1 can (400 ml/13.5 oz) coconut milk (about 1 ½ cups)
- 1 C water
- ⅓ C nutritional yeast
- 3 tablespoon tomato paste
- 2 tablespoon red curry paste (can add 1 more tablespoon for hot)
- 1 ½ tablespoon miso paste
- 1 lime, juice and zest
- 5 to 6 dried kaffir lime leaves
- 2 teaspoon chili powder
- 2 teaspoon garlic powder
- 2 teaspoon onion powder
- 2 teaspoon arrowroot flour
- 1 teaspoon sea salt
- ½ teaspoon white pepper (or ground black pepper)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F.
- To cook the pasta, bring a pot of salted water to a boil. Cook the pasta until al dente. Drain, but do not rinse.
- To prepare the topping, combine the bread crumbs, peanuts, nutritional yeast, garlic powder, chili powder, and sea salt in a small bowl.
- To make the sauce, drain and rinse the cashews. Add to a high-powered blender with the remaining ingredients and blend on high until very smooth.
- Heat a 9-inch cast-iron pan over medium-hight heat and add the vegetable oil and chicken pieces. Brown for 5 to 6 minutes adding salt and pepper to taste, if necessary, until golden brown and crispy in most parts of the pieces of chicken.
- Then turn off the burner and add the pasta, sauce, spinach, cilantro, and thai basil to the pan and stir with the browned chicken until well coated and combined. What looks like an excess amount of sauce will thicken during baking!
- Sprinkle the bread crumb mixture evenly on top.
- Cover with aluminum foil and bake for 20 minutes.
- Remove the foil and bake on the top rack of the oven for 10 minutes until the top is golden brown and the sides are bubbling slightly. Depending on your oven and the distribution of heat, you might want to set the skillet under the broiler for 5 minutes to get the top crispier instead of continuing to bake at 350°F.
Veronica Segura
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Lauren Toyota
Thanks so much!!!
Kenna
Literally one of the most delicious dishes I have ever eaten, I am making it again for Valentine's Day tomorrow! Everyone needs to make this ASAP.
VeganMathematician
THIS RECIPE IS SOOOO GOOOOODD!! Gonna make the pizza mac and cheese next week since this one turned out soooooo good. I am so happy you exist, we make so many of your recipes and they are all fantastic.
Lauren Toyota
thank you so much! Happy you're enjoying it all 😀
K
Do you, or anyone reading this, have a preferred brand of vegan chicken? I don't have any experience buying/ cooking with it.
diana loreens
I like how the writer organized his thoughts in addition to he visual part.