Mmm...Pasta!

I love pasta. Lasagna, spaghetti, baked ziti...mmm...you name it. It's just so delicious! It's hard to meet someone who doesn't love a good pasta dish. My friend Mo's signature dish is Penne a la vodka. As many of you know Penne a la vodka is laden with heavy cream and cheese. So, when he decided to veganize this dish I was extremely overjoyed.

Mimic Creme (made with almond and cashew cream) to replace heavy cream, earth balance butter (non-dairy), and vegan parmesan.

-1 pound of Spaghetti
-Olive Oil
-1 jar of Pasta Sauce
-1 cup of vegan cream (Mimic Creme)
-Crushed Red Peppers (to taste)
-Garlic powder (to taste)
-3 Table spoons of vegan butter (earth balance)
-1/4 cup of Vodka
-Vegan Parmesan (to taste) 


-Boil some water with olive oil and then add pasta. Take out pasta and strain in. In the same pot, melt butter with crushed red peppers. Lower the heat, add vodka, and simmer. Pour in pasta sauce and cream, and raise heat to medium-high. Next, sprinkle with the parmesan cheese and garlic powder. And lastly, mix in the spaghetti with the sauce until the spaghetti is well coated with sauce. 

Here is the end result:

He used spaghetti instead of Penne pasta. I added Match Meat ground beef to mine. 

The meal was pretty good. It didn't taste exactly like the non-vegan version but I liked it. This version has a much lighter feel to the whole dish and you don't feel stuffed and weighed down after eating it...I'm guessing it's because of the removal of the heavy cream and real cheese.