Spicy Nacho Cheese Sauce

I could eat Mexican food 7 days a week. One of my quick, cheap and easy favorites is Nachos. When I went vegan I tried several different cheese sauces and while most were good, I didn't find one that I really liked, so I combined a few to make one that I did.

Spicy Nacho Cheese Sauce Yield:

What you will need:

• 1 large onion chopped

• 2-3 large carrots, chopped

• 2-3 medium sized potatoes, peeled & chopped (Yukon Gold or Russet work the best)

• 1 cup nutritional yeast

• 1 tbsp onion powder

• 1 tbsp garlic powder

• 1 tsp cayenne (*more if you prefer it hotter)

• 1 tsp red chili flakes (*more if you like it hotter)

• 1/2 tsp turmeric (*optional for color)

• 1-2 cans of low sodium Rotel tomatoes (*optional but is very good!)

• 1 tbsp lactic acid powder, optional

• 1 tbsp tapioca flour, optional

How to Make The Spicy Nacho Cheese Sauce:

1. Add your chopped onion, carrots and potatoes to a medium sauce pan and fill with water until it covers them all. Place that on the stove over high heat and boil until fork tender.

2. When the veggies are cooked, add them to a high speed blender and turn on high, be sure to save the water as you will need to add a little of it to the mixture in the blender. Add it little by little until you get a good creamy sauce.

3. To that mixture in the blender add the nutritional yeast, onion and garlic powder, cayenne and red chili flakes.

4. At this point I like to add the lactic acid powder. This will help give the cheese sauce a little bit of a tang. I then add the tapioca flour as when it is heated later, this helps make it a bit stretchy and gooey.

5. After that is good and blended, I discard the remainder of the water and pour the mixture from the blender into the sauce pan and put it back on the stove over medium heat.

6. As that heats up, stir it regularly as it thickens up. You can then add the can(s) of Rotel tomatoes to it if you like.

Serving Suggestions:

I am old school and I just love chips and queso. I like to cut up corn tortillas and air fry them until they are crispy. This also goes great on a big plate of nachos.

Storing leftovers in the refrigerator:

To store in the fridge I suggest placing the leftovers in an airtight container. It will stay good for up to a week, though it usually don't last that long.