Pretty much every time I go to Whole Foods I buy some of their whole wheat pizza dough. It's so good and it there are endless options for what you can make with it. At this point I have a bunch of it in my freezer so I decided to finally make some pizza! 

Instructions:
Put the cashews in water to soak.

Slice potatoes thinly using either a knife or a mandolin. Make sure that they are all the same width so that they cook evenly. Place them in a bowl full of luke warm water and salt for at least an hour. After they are done soaking, lay potatoes out on a towel and cover with another one to soak up all the moisture. This process gets some of the starch and liquid out of the potatoes so that they crisp better. 

While the potatoes are soaking slice the onion and red bell pepper into thin strips.

Preheat the oven to 500 degrees. 
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Roll out the pizza dough to your desired shape based on your cooking surface. If you are using a cookie sheet sprinkle some ground corn meal on the tray or use parchment paper to make sure it doesn't stick. If you have a pizza stone, make sure you put enough flour or corn meal on your pizza peel so that the pizza dough will slide off easily when transferring into the oven (admittedly I have yet to perfect this myself as you can see in the post-oven photo). 

To prepare the cashew sauce place all of the ingredients in a food processor or high quality blender (such as a Vitamix or Ninja) and blend until smooth. The amount of water I used is approximate. Add it a little at a time as needed for the ingredients to blend together well. 

Put the rolled out pizza dough on the pizza peel or cookie sheet. Spread a generous layer of the cashew sauce on the pizza dough. Cover the pizza with potatoes, overlapping them slightly. If you have extra cashew cheese you could put another layer of the sauce over the potatoes. I didn't do this but I think it would be a great addition and help keep the peppers and onions on the pizza. Next evenly distribute the peppers and onions over the pizza. Sprinkle the chives over the pizza. 

Put pizza in the oven and cook for 15 minutes. 

Top with red pepper flakes as desired. Cool, slice, and serve. Enjoy!

This sauce is so simple I was amazed. I had a butternut squash and a recipe I wanted to make that only called for half of it (to be posted later), so I needed something to do with the other half. I had seen sauces made with butternut squash before, but had never attempted one myself. Since I am always trying to find a vegan cheese/cream sauce that my boyfriend, Jay, will like I thought I would give it a shot.

I thought roasting the squash would add a little something extra to the sauce flavor. In choosing spices to roast it with I thought adding nutritional yeast here could add a little bit more of the cheesy taste that I am always looking for. I wasn't exactly sure what I would add to make the sauce besides some more nutritional yeast and some non-dairy milk - turns out I didn't need a whole lot more - check out below! When Jay tasted the sauce as I was making it he said it really had that cheesy flavor that most of my sauces are missing! The cheesy flavor diminished a bit during cooking, which I'll have to work on, but we both agreed that the consistency was spot on.

Ingredients:
1/2 Butternut Squash, peeled with seeds removed
Olive oil
3 TB Nutritional Yeast
Ginger Powder
Onion Powder
1 Box Whole wheat pasta of your choice (I used shells - elbow or rigatoni would work well too)
1 Cup non-dairy milk (I used unsweetened almond milk)
1 Clove Garlic
1/2 Cup Bread crumbs

Instructions:
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Slice squash into quarter inch thick pieces and place on a baking sheet with parchment paper. Lightly oil the top of the squash, just enough so it doesn't get burnt (if you aren't using parchment paper then oil both sides of the squash). Sprinkle the squash with nutritional yeast (this is not where you use the full three tablespoons), ginger powder, and onion powder. Roast for 30 minutes. Let cool.

While the squash is roasting cook your pasta according to package directions.

Peel and slice the garlic clove into about 4 slices. Once the squash is cool to the touch add it to your food processor or blender (my blender only works well with a lot of liquid so I used my food processor). Add half the non-dairy milk, garlic, and 2 tablespoons of nutritional yeast. Blend until smooth. Continue to add the rest of the milk and nutritional yeast until you have the desired flavor.

Combine the pasta with 2 cups of the sauce and place in a casserole dish lined with parchment paper. Sprinkle pasta with a little bit more nutritional yeast and bread crumbs. Cover with aluminum foil and cook for 15 minutes. Remove the foil and broil 5 minutes uncovered. Enjoy!

Note: I've entered this recipe in theVirtual Vegan Linky Potluck 23 - check it out!