We love casseroles in this house. For these dinners we just empty out our fridge and put it all into the meal :) Last week I really wanted to try making the dish without cheese. If you recall, the vegan lasagna I made a while back had a cashew mixture in it instead of cheese. I loved that and thought I could try something similar here as well. The results were fabulous! I think better than cheese, and definitely healthier! By the way, this is also gluten free and could easily be made vegan.

Ingredients:

2 cups cooked quinoa
1 cup kale
1 cup chard
1/2 onion
4 egg whites (omit if vegan)
5 garlic cloves, minced

{cashew "cheese"}

1/4 cup cashews
1 cup almond milk or milk of your choosing
1 block tofu
1/3 cup olive oil
1 cup nutritional yeast (optional)
1 tablespoon red pepper flakes (optional for spice)

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350°. In a blender/food processor/Vitamix, combine cashew "cheese" ingredients until it is all smooth. There are two options on how to proceed at this point. You can combine all ingredients in a bowl, mix it all up, and then put into a greased casserole dish. The other choice is to layer the quinoa, veggies, and garlic into the dish. Then, poor the egg whites over that and finish by putting the cashew "cheese" on top. The second option is what I ended up doing. Bake for about 30 minutes. We enjoyed ours with some hot sauce for a kick.

Healthy hints:

We used vegetables we had sitting around, but you can easily substitute them for whatever you have available.
You can also use farro, brown rice, lentils, or anything else you think up instead of or in addition to quinoa.
This could easily be made vegan. Just take out the egg whites. I like the added protein and how it helps everything stick together but it is not necessary. If you mix the cashew "cheese" in with the quinoa and veggies, it should help everything stick a little better.

vegetarian casserole