These vegan scalloped potatoes are made with a creamy, cheesy sauce thickened with chickpeas and containing no flour, starch, gluten, or soy.
I almost let January slip away without a blog post. Christmas vacation for me extended from December 19, when my daughter E came home from college, until January 23, when she went back. During that time, I did a lot of cooking but absolutely no creating of new recipes because I was busy making E all of her old favorites. Apparently, even with a college dining hall with a dedicated vegan station, the food choices get old, and she came home craving home cooking.
I was prepared for her to ask for lasagna, pasta with white sauce, and macaroni and cheese, but I wasn’t expecting her to want so many mashed potatoes. I made them for our substitute “Thanksgiving meal” with baked tofu and pumpkin cheesecake and again the night before she flew back to school–she ate the leftovers in the car on the way to the airport, determined to enjoy them right up until the last minute. Whatever mistakes I’ve made as a parent, instilling an unhealthy fear of carbs is not one of them!
I kept intending to make vegan scalloped potatoes while she was here, and this recipe was brewing in the back of my mind for a few weeks, but any time I suggested it, E preferred mashed. So it wasn’t until today that I finally got around to trying out my idea for a scalloped potato dish with a sauce made from chickpeas and no starch or flour as thickener.
Actually, I’ve been making the sauce for a couple of months now, heating it on the stove and serving it over baked potatoes, so putting it all into a casserole dish together is really only being practical. It saves me from having to bake the potatoes and sauce separately and dirtying a saucepan.
It’s probably the easiest cheesy sauce I’ve ever made, but it’s not highly seasoned, so if you want to kick it up a notch or two, add some hot smoked paprika or chipotle powder.
Vegan Scalloped Potatoes with Chickpea Cheese Sauce
Ingredients
- 3/4 cup chickpeas canned or home cooked with liquid
- 3/4 cup almond milk or other non-dairy milk plain and unsweetened
- 1/4 cup nutritional yeast
- 1 clove large garlic
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon turmeric
- 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
- 1 tablespoon fresh chives snipped
- 2 pounds potatoes Yukon gold or red (see note above)
- additional snipped chives for garnish
Instructions
- Open a can of chickpeas. Pour the liquid into a 2-cup measuring cup and add enough non-dairy milk to reach the 1 1/2 cup mark. (If using home-cooked chickpeas, use 3/4 cup cooking liquid.) Pour into blender. Add 3/4 cup of chickpeas, nutritional yeast, garlic, salt, turmeric, and pepper. Blend on high speed until completely smooth. Add the chives without blending and set aside.
- Preheat oven to 400F and lightly oil a medium-sized casserole dish. (The oil prevents sticking; leave it out at your own risk.)
- Wash the potatoes and peel them if you like. Slice them about 1/4-inch thick (a mandolin speeds up the process and ensures that they are all the same thickness.) Place about a third of them overlapping to cover the bottom of the dish. Pour about 1/2 cup of the sauce over them. Add another layer and cover with another 1/2 cup of sauce. Repeat with remaining potatoes and sauce.
- Cover tightly with foil and bake for 45 minutes. Remove foil and bake for another 15-25 minutes, or until the potatoes are fork tender. If the top starts to brown too much, loosely cover with foil until potatoes are done.
- Sprinkle with additional chives and serve hot.
Notes
Nutritional info is approximate.
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I promise to be back with a new post in less than a month this time. Maybe I’ll make something for the Super Bowl. Any requests?
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Saniel Underwood
January 31, 2016 at 9:54 pmWill try for tomorrow
Maria
January 31, 2016 at 9:57 pmSusan, you slid into “home” with a January post that’s a winner! This looks great–supreme comfort food and not a lot of fuss! I bet once E tastes these they will be on her favorite list, too. xoxo
Nottingham Kate
February 1, 2016 at 2:50 amThis looks fabulous Susan, as always. I was reading the blog on the 30th of Jan thinking “Is this it? Is this going to be the first month she doesn’t post?” But, you’ve given us a winner here, I’m sure. I always look forward to reading and making your recipes Susan, you are a superstar.
Cindy Plachinski
February 1, 2016 at 5:30 amGoing to try the chick pea sauce recipe..thanks for posting.
Helyn
February 1, 2016 at 5:56 amSusan, this dish looks great! Can’t wait to give it a try. Thanks for sharing!
Em
February 1, 2016 at 8:22 amYou’re back!! Missed you. My youngest was here too for the holidays and it seems I was cooking plenty of healthy carbs. Just made a batch of mashed so I m going to save this one for next week. Spicy collards and maybe a bean loaf and yum!! I love using the aquafaba from cooked chickpeas.
Jill
February 1, 2016 at 10:51 amWill this cheese sauce work for nachos? I got a request for nachos from a friend, but I told him the cheese sauce might be out of my league. LOL. I usually eat nachos with guacamole and no vegan cheese sauce.
Love the photo of the vegan station. It’s so great to see this at colleges, it indicates that veganism is mainstream in this age group, and it also serves to pull in non-vegans in a non-threatening and inclusive way. I became a vegetarian in college at Berkeley and back then (1970s), there was really nothing on offer at the university cafes except salads. That was the heyday of the Food Co-Op in Berkeley, though, so finding bulk stuff like rice and beans was easy. I hosted my share of potlucks which included lots of vegetarian enchiladas and other casseroles. 🙂 I also blew up my share of pressure cookers cooking beans!
Susan Voisin
February 1, 2016 at 11:06 amJill, you could try heating the sauce on the stove and adding chili powder to it for a nacho sauce. But it might be a little thin, in which case I would add more chickpeas. But if you can use potato starch, I recommend the nacho cheese recipe here: https://blog.fatfreevegan.com/2014/01/roasted-cauliflower-bites-vegan-nacho-cheese-sauce.html
I envy your spending the 70’s in Berkeley. Things have changed a lot for vegans, but that was a really special time and place.
Jill
February 1, 2016 at 2:48 pmSusan, I have seen that nacho cheese recipe of yours several times and for some reason it kept falling off my radar. But it’s perfect, and I’ll use it, thanks!
Yes, it was a special time. It was fun trekking down on the weekend to the Berkeley Co-op and picking up fresh veggies and bulk foods where they had the store indoors and set up stalls in the parking lot. They usually had music and jugglers and it was just a great time.
Back then was when I did my first recycling, Berkeley had a recycling center since 1970 (must have come on the heels of the first Earth Day?), so of course we all were saving up our glass bottles and cardboard and cans to take to the recycling center. 🙂
Lots of political activity back then, I was a member of the Student Socialist Group, we organized for the TMI accident, Diablo Canyon, Central American policy, and then in the 80s AIDS activism took off. Memories!
Nona
February 1, 2016 at 11:36 amNot food related but my first thought was… Woah! E is in college?! Wow…where has the time gone? Okay… Thanks for this recipe, my picky 2 year old daughter loves potatoes and slipping in some legumes via the sauce is a win.
Lee
February 1, 2016 at 2:28 pmOh my gosh, Susan, this looks so good. And I love potato skins, so I’m going to leave ’em on there. Printing and pinning this right now! Oh, and as a side note, I made your lentil and cauliflower rice taco filling (now a staple for hubby and me) for my mom, and she LOVED it. Thought you’d like to know! 🙂
Aubrey
February 1, 2016 at 3:24 pmThese look so delicious. I am so glad I found your site!:))
Mary Mataja
February 1, 2016 at 3:58 pmI’ve been a subscriber since I went (fat-Free) vegan in 2006. Your blog has been such an important part of my daily cooking, that I somewhat take it for granted. Wanted to Thank You for all the fabulous recipes, that I know I can always eat. It’s such a treat to receive your e-mails. Happy February!
Danielle
February 2, 2016 at 3:32 amThis looks awesome and I’m putting all the ingredients on my grocery list right now! Thank you for sharing your recipes and pictures.
I DO have a request for a Super Bowl snack even though I am not going to watch the Super Bowl, haha… stuffed/baked potato skins! I’m imagining twice-baked potato skins with the innards scooped out and mixed with cheesy sauce (or some other kind of sauce), and topped with diced tomatoes and shredded lettuce. I love the idea of the cool tomatoes and lettuce atop the hot potato skins.
Rosalie Covello
February 2, 2016 at 10:23 amwe are interested in purchasing a pressure cooker, think its called one pot. we would like you to get credit for it. how do we set it up?
thanks
Tom F
February 2, 2016 at 7:34 pmThis looks like a great recipe …. nice to see how you are using the chickpeas!
Ruth
February 2, 2016 at 10:04 pmI’m always so thrilled when you post a new recipe, Susan. When I saw this one, I knew I had to try it. It was fabulous! I did change the recipe just a little, because I didn’t have chives, and because, well, I had some other stuff in the fridge I decided to throw in. I added 1 teaspoon of smoked paprika, 1/2 teaspoon of hickory liquid smoke, and 1 tablespoon tomato paste to the sauce. Instead of chives, I chopped up half an onion and fried them in a nonstick pan with a few slices of Sweet Earth Seitan Bacon. Oh, and I forgot to put the garlic in the sauce so I cooked it with the onions. I crumbled the “bacon” into the onions and then layered them with the potatoes. It smelled so good when it was cooking we could hardly wait for them to be done. And it tasted just as good as it smelled. Thanks for another amazing recipe!
Hailey Gladden
February 3, 2016 at 8:49 pmThis sounds great! What size casserole dish would you recommend for this recipe? I’ll have to go out to buy one and I’m really not sure which size would work best. Thanks.
Susan Voisin
February 3, 2016 at 9:38 pmI used a shallow dish that was about 7×10 inches, but a little larger or smaller would work, too.
Elisabetta@Però Sano
February 4, 2016 at 10:08 amIt looks like my mum’s potato gateau! Love this kind of dishes, they make you feel at home <3 Nice recipe, Susan!
Karen
February 4, 2016 at 4:23 pmHi Susan! Happy new year to you, too. Glad to hear that you got to enjoy more time with E. while she was home for the break. Isn’t it fun to see changes in preferences as adult children come back from college?
Thanks for this recipe and the idea to use chickpeas instead of flour. I’ve had a yen for scalloped potatoes lately, too, and used some brown rice flour as thickener. I like the idea of blending whole chickpeas for added leguminous goodness.
I also enjoy baked onions, especially at this time of year when there are cold viruses going around. I put slivered onions at the base of the casserole, then the potatoes and sauce. This seems to prevent some sticking at the bottom of the dish. Also, I precooked the potatoes in the Instant Pot electric pressure cooker. This made it very easy to slice them. I usually leave the skin on since I want the extra fiber and any nutrients that may be in or close to the skin. I cut the potatoes in half before slicing, so the diameter isn’t too large for my mouth.
Thanks for mentioning the addition of chives. I forget to add those and will try to put them in for flavor and color.
May this be the start of a wonderful year for you and your family!
Kathleen
February 4, 2016 at 6:52 pmSusan,
This looks delicious! Thank-you for inspiring so many of us with delicious, healthy recipes! I look forward to trying this one.
-Kathleen
Christine (Run Plant Based)
February 5, 2016 at 8:02 amLooks wonderful, cant wait to try because I haven’t had scalloped potatoes in ages. Thanks!
Martha Osborne
February 5, 2016 at 11:47 amThis is the most delicious thing I’ve made in a long time…..maybe in forever! Thanks, Susan! YUMMY!!!
Anna Gross
February 5, 2016 at 1:39 pmve been looking at your site for a couple days now, and it looks great. I just made your sauce, with one modification, Instead of milk i just added a handful of cashews and water, and blended it all together and it tastes amazing! I have some potatoes just about baked and am super excited to top them with this great oil free sauce! This is going to be my go to “cheese” sauce, I love the way you cook! Keep up the great work, and THANK YOU!!
Anna
ALLAN
February 5, 2016 at 6:26 pmI DO NOT SEE ANY CHEESE IN YOUR RECIPY FOR VEGAN SCALLOPED POTATOES WITH CHICKPEA CHEESE SAUCE
Jcb
June 16, 2016 at 12:34 pmFor Allan,
Vegan = no dairy. Hence no cheese.
Scott the hypnotist
February 5, 2016 at 11:20 pmReally nice idea to have scalloped potatoes. You don’t see that on a lot of vegan blogs. Really nice recipe 🙂 Thanks
Danielle
February 7, 2016 at 11:06 amI made this last night and it was REALLY TASTY! I used a can of cannellini beans instead of garbanzo. I drained them and made the sauce with all soy milk, and added a few tbsp of white flour to thicken it instead of the aquafaba. I also sliced an onion and added 1/2 to the bottom of the pan, put a layer of potatoes and poured half the sauce, then repeated the layers (I only made 2 layers). It came out so delicious, just perfect for a cool evening. We ate more than half the pan last night with a salad, even though I scaled up this recipe to make enough to fill an 11×13 pan!
Susan, thank you for sharing this recipe!
Em
February 11, 2016 at 7:49 amI made this. BIG hit here. Hardly any leftovers for DH’s lunch. I served it with some collard greens and it was a pretty easy supper. Has become part of our rotation now as there are only 2 kids living here and not here most of the time so am trying to simplify dinner. But anyway- it was sooooo good! Thanks!
Jennifer L Judd
February 22, 2016 at 5:31 pmThis recipe is amazing! Just finishing up the leftovers an I am even loving them cold! Again, one of your recipes rocks!
Zeke
March 5, 2016 at 8:13 pmThanks for the great idea. I took your chickpea cheeze and made a cheeszey filling for my scalloped potatoes that was very satisfying. I love how much using a mandoline expedites making scalloped potatoes into a convenient comfort food.
Chris
March 20, 2016 at 7:59 amI was so excited to try the chickpea scalloped potatoes. Oh they were delicious!!
Feels good to eat yummy potatoes knowing you are also getting protein.
They are a keeper!!!!
Thanks!
daniel
March 24, 2016 at 2:01 amThanks for the vegas potatoes , this is really an amazing yummy recipe
Lori
March 26, 2016 at 4:24 pmWhat could I substitute the yeast for? I’m allergic. Thx!
Susan Voisin
March 26, 2016 at 4:33 pmI’m not sure. The yeast gives it a cheesy-ish flavor, and I’m not sure you can find anything to replace that. You might try leaving it out and adding additional seasonings.
allie
April 15, 2016 at 3:30 pmThis looks great, I can’t wait to try it.
Also–as an aside, although I went to college ten years ago, my school had an entire vegetarian (and mostly vegan) cafe, a vegan food co-op, as well as a vegan station in the dining hall. I was spoiled!
Sue
April 23, 2016 at 1:26 pmI decided to clean up my computer with so many saved sites, its just overwhelming. I saw I had saved your site before and decided to check on why I did this by visiting your site again. THANK HEAVENS I did not just delete your site. I remember why I decided your site was so fantastic that I had to save it and get back to check on your recipes! I thought I would never have escalloped potatoes again when I was diagnosed with an allergy to milk protein and my daughter has done so much research on nutrition and your recipes fit right in with her healthful plans for us for eating! Thank you for creating and sharing your recipes!!!!! I can hardly wait to make the escalloped potatoes. Hurrah and Huzzah to you!!!!
Sabrina
April 28, 2016 at 5:40 pmI made this tonight and it was absolutely delicious! We don’t eat oil at all so I didn’t oil the pan. I didn’t have any problems with it sticking. Thanks for the recipe, I’ll definitely be making it again.
Gail
May 10, 2016 at 12:15 amDear Susan
I love your blog and your delicious recipes, too much to print them all, though I would love them all in one book.
My question is – do you have a published recipe book with all your beautiful pictures and recipes? If so, where can I buy it?
Gail Gabrys
Angela
June 5, 2016 at 11:50 amThese were soooooo delicious. Great cheesy flavor. These will definitely go on the regular list.
Nicole
August 7, 2016 at 8:36 pmYum!!! Saw this on the McDougal site and had to try them. They were awesome and looking forward to tomorrows lunch for the leftovers! I added onion to give it some oomph but, otherwise followed the recipe to a T.
David
August 10, 2016 at 10:53 amHi Susan. I hate to complain but the pop-up at the bottom of your screen is extremely annoying. I have visited this website many times but will probably hesitate to return (and want to leave now) bc of this pop-up. I know advertising is necessary to keep the blog going, but a pop-up that needs to be closed for every new page is way too much. Basically when I click on any link, I have to close that pop-up again. Most pop-ups just appear once on any website.
You also might want to know that, over time, Google can penalize sites in search that have too many ads bc of poor user experience (you can Google that info to verify). You really have to strike that right balance, and, at least for my taste, that pop-up puts you over the line. Other users may not tell you but I can’t imagine that isn’t annoying a large percentage of your users.
However, I very much enjoy your recipes, and will just keep my fingers crossed that you eventually make a change.
Susan Voisin
August 10, 2016 at 11:11 amThank you for your feedback. I’m in the process of re-evaluating my ad options. What kind of device were you using when you experienced the problem (desktop, phone, iPad, etc.)?
Peggy Campbell
August 21, 2016 at 12:58 pmI tried the recipe and it was good…I tried it again but added 1/4 cup canned carrots, one more clove of garlic, 1/4 tsp of cayenne, a full 1/2 tsp of turmeric, 1/4 tsp of gr. cardamom and a tablespoon of toasted sesame oil. I also used 2 full cups for the liquid measurement-cashew milk. Cooked as suggested but in the last 15 minutes I topped it with coconut bacon.
E
August 25, 2016 at 5:16 pmThanks for the recipe! Going to try this tonight! My name is E too!! Just one letter. I thought I was the only one!