Cheezy Broccoli – Super Side Dish
Raw Vegan Grain and Gluten Free!
With the holidays right around the corner, sometimes it’s challenging to provide comfort food to your friends and family that does not take its toll on digestion and weight control. Also, as more and more people are choosing a healthier lifestyle, this dish will be appreciated by many.
The basic recipe and inspiration comes from my friend and colleague, Karen Ranzi, author of Creating Healthy Children: Through Attachment Parenting and Raw Foods. Her website has a wealth of information and she has been 100% raw now for about 20 years!
I have made a few modifications according to my tastes and preferences. Just made a big batch yesterday and am thrilled with the outcome.
Cheezy Breezy Broccoli
Ingredients:
4-5 cups of broccoli
1/3 cup raw macadamia nuts
2 TB. pine nuts
1/4 cup sundried tomatoes
1 cup filtered water
2-3 TB. nutritional yeast
1 lemon, juiced
sea salt, to taste
Directions: Soak macadamias and pinenuts for about 2 hours. Soak sundried tomatoes separately in one half of the filtered water.
Wash the broccoli thoroughly and chop into pieces. Peel the outer fibrous later – it will make a huge difference in how this dish tastes!
Place the chopped and peeled broccoli in a casserole dish and pour one half of the lemon juice and massage it into the pieces for a few minutes.
Drain and rinse the macadamias and pinenuts and place in blender along with sundried tomatoes PLUS soaking water. Add the nutirtional yeast, remaining lemon juice and blend, adding the other half cup of water as needed. The “cheese” blend should be creamy and smooth. Salt to taste OR you can use dulse flakes if you are avoiding salt. Pour over broccoli, making sure all of the pieces are coated. Sprinkle a little extra nutritional yeast on top.
Place in dehydrator at 115 degrees for 2-4 hours depending on how dry you’d like it to be. No dehydrator? Place in low temperature oven – leaving the door slightly ajar. Heat until broccoli is warm (not hot!) to touch and cheeze mixture has slightly hardened.
Make sure to leave feedback as to how these go over for your holiday party!
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