Cashew Mozzarella Quinoa Crust Pizza Recipe

Cashew Mozzarella Quinoa Crust Pizza Vegan Recipe

Quinoa crust pizza topped with melted cashew mozzarella vegan cheese. This quinoa pizza is naturally gluten free, wheat free, flour free and dairy free. A high protein vegan and gluten free pizza that contains all essential amino acids.

Full of heart healthy fats from the cashew dairy free cheese. If you need convincing to make this then watch the video recipe below to see the gooey vegan cashew mozzarella as you pick up a slice. Suitable for gluten-free, dairy-free, whole 30 vegan and general healthy diets.

Cashew Mozzarella gooey vegan Quinoa Crust Pizza

In this gluten free pizza recipe the quinoa is not boiled but instead is soaked and blended then cooked in the oven. The resulting quinoa crust pizza is firm enough to eat with your hands yet has a crispy outside with a fluffy centre.

It may look like a lot of ingredients and take an hour in total to make but each step is very easy. The oven is doing all work and only a small amount of prep is needed.

The cashew mozzarella is especially easy to make, and the only way you can really go wrong is not stirring enough and the bottom burning.

Quinoa Crust Pizza with Cashew Mozzarella Video Recipe

Play on YouTube.

You can place the pizza back in the oven after putting the tomato sauce and cashew cheese on it. I’m sure this would look even better as the cheese would get a bit of colour on it. But I’m all about simple and quick recipes – I’m quite happy to just eat it as soon as it’s topped.

The residual heat of the quinoa pizza makes the tomato sauce warm and the cheese is hot from the simmering to make it stringy.

I try to avoid heating my nuts too much as it destroys lots of the goodness and delicate fats in them. While this cashew cheese isn’t raw it’s only gently heated for a few minutes.

I prefer raw basil leaves on top. I tried for my last pizza cooking the basil in the oven, but it didn’t look very appetising so I replaced them with fresh leaves for the photos.

cashew mozzarella quinoa crust with fresh tomatoes and basil

I created a sunflower seed cheese pizza that uses the same base. However, the cheese on that didn’t go gooey like this and many did say they could tell from the look of it that it was a healthy plant based pizza. Hopefully, this one looks more like traditional pizza with mozzarella.

Nut Free Vegan Cheese Pizza

If cashew nuts are expensive where you are you can make this with sunflower seeds. It won’t be quite as white and smooth but it will still be delicious. I eat way too many cashew nuts so often opt for the sunflower seed version.

This quinoa crust pizza is also grain free is quinoa is technically a seed. Quinoa is a great addition to a vegan diet as it contains all essential amino acids that the body can’t produce so is a complete protein.

It’s not vital that every food contains all essential amino acids as you can get them all by eating a variety of plant-based foods, just handy to know that quinoa has them all.

a messy slice of quinoa crust vegan pizza

The tapioca starch this helps tip to give the cashew cheese that stringy mozzarella type texture. Tapioca starch is a key ingredient that can’t be substituted if you want gooey vegan cheese.

This cashew mozzarella cheese has a mild creamy taste and is stringy and gooey. Tapioca starch is a bit of a nutrient void ingredient – it’s just there for the texture.

To give this vegan pizza more flavour double the nutritional yeast, or add yeast extract or miso. It tastes similar to how I remember mozzarella tasting – gooey and stringy but with a very mild creamy taste.

picking up a vegan cheese pizza with cashew nuts

Nutritional yeast is a vegan condiment made from dried inactive yeast. It has a cheesy nutty taste and is naturally high in b vitamins, although not b12 unless it’s been specifically added (some brands have added b12).

Nutritional yeast is an important ingredient in vegan cheese recipes to give the cheesy nutty taste. It can be replaced with yeast extract if you don’t have any. The recipe still works without nutritional yeast but lacks a cheesy umami taste.

Yield: 1 pizza

Quinoa Crust Cashew Cheese Pizza

Cashew Mozzarella Quinoa Crust Pizza Vegan Recipe

Quick and easy recipe for a quinoa crust pizza that is topped with melted cashew mozzarella. The quina base is naturally gluten free and cashew cheese tastes amazing without any dairy or unhealthy oils.

Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 45 minutes
Total Time 1 hour

Ingredients

QUINOA CRUST PIZZA INGREDIENTS

  • ¾ cup / 135 g quinoa
  • ¼ tsp salt
  • ½ tsp cayenne pepper
  • ½ tsp baking powder
  • 3/4 cup / 175 ml water

CASHEW MOZZARELLA CHEESE INGREDIENTS

  • 1/3 cup / 50 g cashews
  • 2 tbsp nutritional yeast
  • 1 clove garlic
  • 1 cup / 240 ml water
  • pinch of salt
  • 2 tbsp tapioca starch

PIZZA TOPPING INGREDIENTS

  • Use any that you like, this is just a guide
  • 6 tbsp sieved tomatoes/tomato paste
  • basil leaves

Instructions

  1. Soak the quinoa for 15 mins or overnight.
  2. Rinse and drain the quinoa then put in a blender jug with all the other ingredients and blend until smooth.
  3. Line an 8″ pan with greaseproof paper or just use a silicon pan and pour in the quinoa batter.
  4. Bake the pizza batter 30-35 mins and 375 F / 190 C, until a knife comes out clean.
  5. Let the quinoa pizza base stand for 5 mins and then take out of the pan.
  6. Bake pizza base for 10 mins on no tray at 375 F / 190 C, just to make it crispy on both sides.
  7. Put all of the cashew mozzarella ingredients apart from the tapioca starch into a blender and blend until smooth.
  8. Empty the mozzarella mixture into a pan and sift in the tapioca starch.
  9. Heat gently while stirring constantly to stop the bottom from burning. It’s ready when it’s thick and gooey and rolls off the spoon slowly.
  10. Spread the tomato sauce or passatta over the base, then blob on the cashew mozzarella and sprinkle with basil leaves.

Notes

You can place the quinoa pizza back in the oven after topping with the cashew cheese, I usually don't but some people like the cashew cheese a bit browned.

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Nutrition Information

Yield

6 slices

Serving Size

1

Amount Per Serving Calories 142Total Fat 7gSaturated Fat 1gTrans Fat 0gUnsaturated Fat 5gCholesterol 0mgSodium 329mgCarbohydrates 17gFiber 2gSugar 1gProtein 5g
quinoa crust gluten free pizza with cashew stringy cheese

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31 thoughts on “Cashew Mozzarella Quinoa Crust Pizza”

    1. Hello, we use a small jug blender the video. There are many different brands that all seem to be about the same – nutribullet, nutrininja, blendtec 🙂

  1. I’m not sure if the tapioca starch is key to making that cheese have that consistency but i just tried it with rice flour and it just made my cashew cheese lumpy instead of gooey and stretchy like on this video. Maby ill look for tapioca starch in another store as the store i went to didnt have any

    1. Hi, yes the tapioca starch is really the key ingredient. Some have made with corn starch with good results as it goes thick and gooey but it won’t have the stringiness that tapioca starch gives it.

    1. I don’t think so, you can try with cornstarch if you can’t get any tapioca starch. It won’t quite be the same but will still be good 🙂

  2. The recipe says 2 tsp of yeast and tapioca starch but the video says 2 tbsp. the tablespoon measurement is the correct one! The cheese didn’t thicken enough with just 2 tsp.

    1. Bastian Nest and Glow

      Hi Theresa, I think some cashews and nutritional yeast can be more yellow than others. Maybe try a different brand of cashews? When I visited a cashew factory only the very white ones were sold as a premium whole nut. You could reduce the nutritional yeast a bit but that would obviously affect the flavour. Mine has always come out pretty white. 🙂

  3. Hallo Bastian,
    how can I store the rest of the “mozzarella” which didn’t fit on the pizza? I put it in the fridge to chill and get a shape, but maybe freezer is better? any experience? Never used the tapioca starch, so no idea how it works…
    Thank you very much for sharing all those great recipes, I love them and can’t way to try the next one!
    Nora

    1. I personally would store in the fridge and then use within a few days as the freezer can ruin the texture and often I leave things in there for too long. Some people have used this cashew mozzarella to make breaded baked sticks 🙂 Thanks for your kind words & glad you like the recipes.

  4. This sounds awesome. We will make it this week, thank you. Quick question, have you frozen the crust after cooking? I thought about making several crusts to freeze to use later.

    1. Bastian Nest and Glow

      Thanks, you’re welcome. I haven’t frozen the crust but my mum has and says it works great cooking from frozen. I would make a batch to freeze if I had a bigger freezer! 🙂

  5. This looks great. Quick question, your video says to bake it for 25 minutes but your recipe says to bake it for 30-35 minutes plus then an additional 10 minutes with no rack, but the video doesn’t show or mention any additional baking. Just wanted to see which details are correct. I definitely plan to try this receipe. Thanks!

    1. Bastian Durward

      Hi Heather, the details in the text are the ones to follow. I do update the recipes with feedback from users, and for this one many people said it was better double baking so added that and I can’t go back and change the video once it’s live. I hope you like the recipe 🙂

  6. Hi,
    Thank you for the recipe! I wanted to ask, when I made the pizza crust it took double the time to cook and the middle was still quite soft and a bit uncooked. Should I have added more baking powder? Or made it thinner?
    Other then that, it was great!

    1. Hey, it’s so difficult as natural produce varies a lot. I would try adding a bit less water, what size pan did you use? Mine tends to be quite a thick one 🙂

  7. This was SOOOOO good! Just heated up the extra “cheese” with cauliflower rice and low sodium pasta sauce. So much better than store bought plant-based cheese. THank you!

    1. Bastian Durward

      Amazing! So glad to hear it worked out well. I agree this cheese is much better than anything in the shops – and way cheaper 😀

    1. Bastian Durward

      I didn’t in the recipe, maybe because I’m impatient. But you can do and some like to bake after cheesing it up 🙂

  8. Hi, quinoa is very expensive where I stay. Can I replace it with any other millet? Like foxtail or kodo millets?

  9. Thanks for this recipe! My niece is vegan, and I’m no grains and trying to move away from dairy, so this is amazing. I’ll def try this – it looks delicious.
    Also for others, I buy organic cashew pieces (for my cashew milk) and it’s much more affordable. I understand cashews is worthwhile buying organic if you can. ?

  10. We just finished eating this and enjoyed it – thank you! My fiancé is kind of a picky eater, and not vegan, but he really liked it! For simplicity, I used organic basil & tomato pasta sauce and sprinkled the top w/ dry basil. How many serving sizes does this pizza make? (The 2 of us ate the whole pizza!).

  11. Thank you for this recipe! I will definitely be using quinoa for various baked goods again. Adds a really nice taste to it.

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