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Spinach Penne with Red Bell peppers Spinach Penne is a creamy, filling and vegan pasta dish.
Jump to RecipeMeatless monday or any weeknight quick fix! Powder some cashews, mix in with water, salt, roasted garlic, chipotle habanero sauce. Get your pasta ready. Stir fry some veggies, toss in the pasta and sauce, cook for 2-3 minutes until sauce thickens. done! You can call this alfredo-ish sauce if you add some nutritional yeast for the cheesy flavor. Easily made gf too. The cashew cream makes this very filling.
Spinach Penne with Red Bell peppers, Cherry tomatoes in Chipotle Habanero garlicky Cashew cream sauce. vegan
Ingredients
For the sauce:
- 1/4 cup raw cashews powdered
- 1/2 cup water
- 5-6 garlic cloves
- 1/3 teaspoon salt
- 2 teaspoons Chipotle Habanero Hot sauce or to taste, I used Melinda's Chipotle Hot sauce, start with 1 tsp and add more 🙂
- Or 1 chipotle pepper and 1/2+ teaspoon plain habanero sauce or any hot sauce.
Pasta:
- 1 teaspoon organic canola oil
- 1 cup veggies, we uses some sliced up Red and Green bell peppers and cherry tomatoes
- 1.5 cups whole grain Spinach Penne
Toppings:
- 1/3 cup Cherry tomatoes
- 1/2 teaspoon dried basil
- nutritional yeast, optional
Instructions
- In a large pan, add the oil and heat on medium. Add garlic cloves, stir and cook till they are golden 2-3 minutes, or use roasted garlic cloves and continue to the blend step.
- In a blender, add powdered cashew, roasted or golden garlic, water, salt, chipotle hot sauce(or chipotle peppers and hot sauce) and blend until smooth.(It will be a thin cream)
- Prepare pasta according to instructions. Reserve some of the water.
- In the pan with the oil, add sliced/chopped veggies. We used sliced red and green bell peppers and a few cherry tomatoes. Cook on medium till the veggies are half done.( 3-4 minutes).
- For Oil-free version, saute the veggies in water or vegetable broth.
- Add the pasta and cashew cream, mix well and cook on low until the cream starts to bubble and thicken.
- The cream will start thickening very quickly after this point.
- Taste and adjust salt and spices. Add a few Tablespoons of the pasta water to adjust sauce if needed.
- Take off heat.
- Serve hot topped with halved cherry tomatoes, some dried basil and nutritional yeast sprinkle.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
For the 1/4 cup of raw cashews, is it 1/4 cup after they are powdered or 1/4 cup whole cashews and then powder them?
Thank you!
in this recipe it doesnt matter. a loaded 1/4 cup cashews will give you a 1/4 cup ground cashew. a few teaspoons here and there don’t change the sauce.
Richa, I made the cashew-garlic cream sauce yesterday with asparagus and carrots on penne, it was delicious. Your recipes are ingenious, I’ve stopped referring to any other food websites now 🙂 Thanks for sharing your culinary adventures!
Thank you Snehal! I am so happy that you liked it!:)) and thank you for this comment.. made my day!
richa, i love the garlicky cashew cream sauce! that sounds delicious 😀
Thank you Junia! it is 🙂