You Only Need 5 Simple Ingredients to Make Vegan Cream Cheese for Your Bagels
You Only Need 5 Simple Ingredients to Make Vegan Cream Cheese for Your Bagels
Photo: Instagram/@flora_and_vino
Before ditching dairy, it wasn’t uncommon for me to wake up and venture down the street to the corner bodega—still half-asleep—to get myself a toasted bagel smothered in cream cheese. These days, I’m more of a PB-and-toast kind of girl, but that doesn’t mean I don’t ever get the hankering for one of my pre-vegan go-tos. And the next time I do, I’ll be reaching for a can of coconut cream.
I’m not alone in my love of cream cheese-smothered bagels. Lauren Kirchmaier, the recipe developer behind the plant-based food blog Flora & Vino, grew up eating them on a regular basis, which is exactly why she made it her mission to create a dairy-free version she can enjoy.
“During summertime, my mom used to take my sister and I to Chesapeake Bagel Bakery near our house for lunch,” she wrote on Instagram. “I always ordered a bagel sandwich with plain cream cheese and all the veggies in the house. The best part was licking the cream cheese that oozed out of the sides after they sliced it down the middle.”
To recreate that creaminess, she didn’t go for nuts or tofu. This time, coconut cream was the star of the show. After chilling it overnight then combining it with four other kitchen staples—lemon, Himalayan sea salt, nutritional yeast, and maple syrup—she was left with a mix that perfectly firms up in the fridge and spreads on bagels like a champ. I love you, bodegas… but this stuff is going to be pretty hard to beat.
