Vitamix "cheese" sauce

[AlwaysAgnes]

I don't have a vitamix, so I won't be able to try this recipe, but I've made Jill's other oat cheese sauce that's cooked on the stove, and I like the texture that the oats bring to the sauce. I mostly only use "cheese" sauces in butternut mac n cheese or in enchilada casserole. This recipe probably makes more than I'd use, unless I made both of those things in one week. The recipe is written out below the video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKlHFXOjkfA

[GeoffreyLevens]

I think easily made in regular blender or food processor if you have either of those. Not quite as smooth but taste would be exactly the same I bet.

[AlwaysAgnes]

I think easily made in regular blender or food processor if you have either of those. Not quite as smooth but taste would be exactly the same I bet.

Yes. One could blend it all in a regular blender and then transfer and cook it in a pan until it thickens, much like her other oat cheese. This particular recipe makes a larger amount than that one and cooks/thickens in the vitamix.

[VeggieSue]

The original recipe - Mary McDougall's Mac and Oaty Cheese from the McDougall Program for a Healthy Heart book - calls for blending up the ingredients and then cooking it on the stove, constantly stirring until it thickens.

That was written way back when Vitamixes cost even more than they do now and had metal containers and only avid "juicers" like my brother owned one! Recipes were written with normal household blenders in mind. With the price of high speed blenders that can "cook" by friction alone lowered enough that they're now fairly common for home use, the popularity of sauces that can be made in one of those blenders alone, without the use of a stove, have risen greatly. Since I don't own one, I always just mix it up in my Ninja (and my $15 Oster in the years before that) then in 5 minutes on the stove it's ready for use.

[AlwaysAgnes]

The original recipe - Mary McDougall's Mac and Oaty Cheese from the McDougall Program for a Healthy Heart book - calls for blending up the ingredients and then cooking it on the stove, constantly stirring until it thickens.

That was written way back when Vitamixes cost even more than they do now and had metal containers and only avid "juicers" like my brother owned one! Recipes were written with normal household blenders in mind. With the price of high speed blenders that can "cook" by friction alone lowered enough that they're now fairly common for home use, the popularity of sauces that can be made in one of those blenders alone, without the use of a stove, have risen greatly. Since I don't own one, I always just mix it up in my Ninja (and my $15 Oster in the years before that) then in 5 minutes on the stove it's ready for use.

Yes, in Jill's uncut video (it was one of her live things on FB, and she has 2 videos, one uncut and the one I shared above) she mentions that this recipe was her adaption of a McDougall recipe. I think the big difference is that she uses the big jar of roasted bell pepper instead of a small jar of pimiento. The liquid smoke addition is also probably different. I think one can play around with spices and peppers/pimiento. To me, the main thing that makes this cheese sauce nice is the texture the oats bring. I'm not sure how to describe that. Creamy and slick. It's just a different mouthfeel from other cheezy sauces I've had.

I doubt I'll ever own a vitamix.

[VeggieSue]

I think the big difference is that she uses the big jar of roasted bell pepper instead of a small jar of pimiento. The liquid smoke addition is also probably different.

I always used the pimientos, and was thinking of using this latest incarnation of the recipe next time I make it. Jill always makes her recipes look so delicious in those videos! The only thing making me think twice right now is all the sodium in that jar of peppers. The pimientos I buy include only peppers, water, and citric acid, but every jar of roasted red peppers I looked at in the grocery store yesterday has salt included. The brand I usually have on hand is 12 servings, each serving has 80 mg sodium so 960mg sodium in the peppers. That's probably NOT including how much salt is in the liquid in the jar that usually gets discarded but now we're supposed to use. When I use the peppers in other recipes I always rinse them off first to cut the salt and always discard the brine.

And that's on top of 2 teaspoons of sea salt she also says to use! Jill has admitted in a number of videos that she's not low salt or no oil all the time.

Jeff would probably tell us to pass on this recipe. But it sure does look good!

I doubt I'll ever own a vitamix.

I look at them on-line, I drool over them, my husband gets annoyed and tells me to just go ahead and buy the darn thing when he sees me pining over one on the rare occasions we see one live and in person, but I always tell him it's not feasible, financially, for me to do so. The salad dressings and sauces I make now do quite well in my Ninja. We don't eat nuts or drink smoothies so I have no need to pulverize things with a high speed blade. Besides, the noise would be unbearable in this old apartment's kitchen. My family already runs from the room when I turn the Ninja on.

[AlwaysAgnes]

One could always roast their own peppers to put into the sauce or use frozen roasted peppers. Green Giant has a tri-color blend. Ingredients are just roasted peppers. I'm not sure what the green ones would do to the color of the finished cheese sauce.

For those who use lots of roasted pepper in their recipes, it might be worth it to just make up a big batch of roasted peppers whenever bell peppers go on sale. You could then freeze them in amounts that reflect how you use them. Sprouts has good sales ( 2/$1) on big red peppers now and then. I don't use roasted peppers often enough to bother with batch roasting. I do use lots of green bell peppers in my cooking, though.

[VeggieSue]

One could always roast their own peppers to put into the sauce or use frozen roasted peppers.

True, there's always a way to substitute ingredients, but in this case, she emphasized using the liquid from the jar, so to get the same great taste she's pushing, she expects you to use the brine.

I love Jill and her enthusiasm, but I usually do have to make substitutions in her recipes, usually for the salt, sometimes the fat (all the cashews), and sometimes both (Better Than Bouillon and Bush's Chili Beans, for instance).

[AlwaysAgnes]

Maybe someone could do a nutritional analysis for Jill's vitamix cheese sauce recipe and give us the nutritional breakdown for say a 1/2 cup serving, both with and without the salt. Okay, I'll give it a shot. I think most of the sodium in the recipe comes from the 2 tsp sea salt. If you omit that, the sodium content of 1/2 cup sauce would probably be close to the sodium content of whatever peppers (per ounce) you choose. I have a 12-oz jar of Cento roasted peppers in front of me. The sodium listed for an ounce is 85mg. If Jill's recipe makes around 6 cups, I think the calories per 1/2 cup of this oat cheese sauce is around 135. Without the 2 tsp of salt or the 12 ounce jar of peppers, that sauce only has 5mg sodium per 1/2 cup. (That would also be the amount of sodium if you used frozen or home-roasted peppers.) Omitting the 2 tsp salt and using the jar of Cento peppers, a 1/2-cup serving would have around 90 mg sodium. With using both 2 tsp salt and 12-ounce Cento jarred peppers as called for in the recipe, a 1/2-cup serving of sauce would have about 477mg sodium.