Chickpea Cheesecake
It is so amazing what you can do with a can of chickpeas. This recipe for example, cheesecake out of chickpeas, is going to turn out delicious! And it tastes just like real cheesecake! I know there is no cheese in it so it’s not actually cheesecake, it’s chickpea cake. Or chickpea cheesecake. But you wouldn’t know the difference. If you like this recipe be sure to check out this one too! and this one!
Crust
We are going to start with the crust, I’m using Nabisco Grahams. I take out two envelopes of grahams and I also preheat the oven for 350ºf. Now I add one envelope of grahams to the blender at a time. I need to melt a stick of vegan butter so I toss that into the microwave now. Then I add the blended graham cracker to the melted butter. Next I add the other graham crackers to the blender but put two crackers off to the side. The first grahams I pulsed and left some chunks, these ones I turned to a powder. Add that to the melted butter as well, and mix. I have a nine inch springform pan and I’m going to line it with some parchment paper.
Cheese
I add in some of my crust and give it a solid press on the bottom, then build up the sides. I put that crust into the freezer so it firms up. Part of making the chickpea cheese is cashews so I add about two cups of cashews to a saucepan and cover them with water and a pinch of salt. Get the water boiling and let it boil for about fifteen minutes.
In the meantime I drain my chickpeas then add them to the blender along with a tablespoon and a half of vanilla extract, one can of full fat unsweetened coconut milk, about a half cup of maple syrup, and two tablespoons of almond butter. Blend this until incredibly smooth. Once we are close to the correct texture I grate in two lemons and a big pinch of kosher salt, blend. If you don’t want to use lemon you could use lime, different vinegars, citric acid, lactic acid, whatever you prefer!
Baking
At this point our cashews are boiled down. I strain the cashews then dump them right into the cheesecake mixture. And now blend that until it is smooth. After that has blended add in three tablespoons of cornstarch, quickly blend it together. And quickly pour the cheesecake mixture into the crust. Now I crush up one of the crackers we saved from earlier and sprinkle it over top. Carefully add this to the oven and bake it for about forty five minutes. After about forty minutes it is browning a little and looks great so I take it out. The sides got a pinch darker than I wanted so maybe thirty eight minutes. I toss this in the fridge overnight!
Topping
The next day I make a really quick strawberry and clementine topping. I have a saucepan here and the first thing I’m going to do is chop the clementines in half and give them a squeeze into the saucepan but through a strainer. For the strawberries all I’m going to do is chop off the tops, then quarter them and add them to the saucepan. I also want to add a quarter of a teaspoon of vanilla extract and about a quarter cup of maple syrup.
Now we just need to throw this onto the stove, bring it up to a boil, and continue stirring until the strawberries kind of break down. Once it breaks down and everything thickens up you get a really nice syrup out of it. Then I pour it into a glass container, let it cool down, add just a little pinch of salt and give it a stir.
Taste Test
This looks, tastes, and smells like cheesecake! There’s no question! You’d never know it wasn’t really a cheesecake. It’s smooth, rich, it melts in your mouth. This is just like restaurant New York style cheesecake! There’s no chickpea taste, no nut taste. It just tastes like a really good cheesecake! You need to try making this chickpea cheesecake for your family and friends. Watch the full video here!
One Can Of Chickpeas Will Change How You Think About Cheesecake
Ingredients
- 2 envelopes graham crackers
- 1 stick vegan butter
- 2 cups cashews
- 1 can chickpeas
- 1.5 tbsp vanilla extract
- 1 can full fat unsweetened coconut milk
- .5 cup maple syrup
- 2 tbsp almond butter
- 2 lemons
- kosher salt
- 3 tbsp cornstarch
Topping
- few strawberries
- 2 clementines
- 1/4 cup maple syrup
- 1/4 tsp vanilla extract
Instructions
- Add one whole envelope of crackers into the blender and pulse.
- Melt a stick of vegan butter.
- Preheat the oven to 350ºf.
- Add blended crackers to melted butter. Blend the rest of the crackers (except one or two set to the side) into a powder then add that to the butter as well and mix.
- I have a 9 inch springform pan and I line it with parchment paper. Add in the crust and press it down then build it up on the sides. Put it in the freezer to firm.
- Add cashews to saucepan along with water and salt. Get the water boiling and let boil for 15 minutes.
- Drain the chickpeas and add them to the blender along with vanilla extract, coconut milk, maple syrup, and almond butter, blend until smooth.
- Grate in lemons, add kosher salt and blend again.
- Add cashews to mixture and blend until smooth again. Add in cornstarch and blend again. Pour this into the crust. Crush up one of the saved crackers from earlier and sprinkle over top.
- Put it in the oven and bake for about 38 minutes. When it is done put it in the fridge overnight!
- For my topping I chop clementines in half and squeeze them into saucepan then add chopped strawberries, vanilla extract, and maple syrup.
- Put it on the stove, bring it to a boil, and stir until strawberries break down. Pour into glass container and let it cool.
Why can’t you simply share the little bit of text for the recipe – instead of forcing an unwanted install of an unnecessarily power-grabbing browser extension – that won’t install easily anyway: it just CLOCKS……
Kinda pushy, if I may look the gift horse in the mouth – but it’s OBNOXIOUS, to say the least!
I cannot find a recipe for this anywhere! It would be nice ro nit have to watch a video every time I want to make something. Thanks!
You don’t have the cheesecake recipe to print?
Love your videos and the info you provide but would really like to be able to get the recipe from your website in a clear, forthright manner – If you want people to try your food recipes, it should be easy to download a recipe NOT only via YouTube.
Do you have a printable version of this recipe?
I’m so sorry. I almost never leave negative reviews, but this recipe isn’t particularly cheap or easy to make, so I’d like to save people some money, time, and disappointment. It comes out nothing like cheesecake. Two lemons is just way too much — that flavor overpowers everything except for a slight taste of wet cashews. I was very disappointed.
Absolutely awesome – the texture, the taste… the ease in making… It’s pairs well with your choice of berries.
My wife is allergic to eggs and has been craving cheesecake for years.
My daughter is dairy free. Both are gluten free.
This is a tall order!
I made a crust with gluten-free graham crackers.
I was very skeptical, but your wife was pretty convincing.
I made it. Holy smokes, it’s delicious!
It got better the second day.
My wife said the texture is just like the real thing.
Daughter doesn’t believe there’s chickpeas in it.
Thank you for this recipe.
It will be a staple in their dessert options.
Don’t any of your recipes have the nutritional facts included like calories , carbohydrates, fats, sugars etc?
Made this pie for Thanksgiving. I have dairy issues and gluten issues and soy issues I will eat gluten and soy most the time cheese I really do try to avoid. anywhooo😊… The pie was yummy and looks beautiful. I would not consider it a cheesecake replacement, but would call it more of a replacement for peanut butter pie. (if someone has a nut allergy; I do not shockingly,!) I would call this almond butter pie. I guess some things just cannot be substituted it which is sad. Thank you so much for sharing this beautiful tasty dessert. I tagged you on my Facebook post, which has a picture of this beautiful pie
I loved the flavor and how easy this was to make. Mine came out much darker than yours, more of a caramel color.
Just tried this after weeks of delays. I made two big hopefully recoverable mistakes. Used a food processor that barely fit the whole batch and it did not get it smooth enough; oops. Next, after it was in the oven I realized I forgot the corn starch; oops. Pulled it out poured out the batter then added the cornstarch. Back in the oven. Next problem, it took more than a half hour plus in 10 min rechecks until it was reasonably done. So mine took about an hour plus. I lost track of extra 10 mins, maybe 6 extra 10 min times. Last thing, why did mine take so long? Did I put too much liquid in? I checked the recipe and I see you say 1 cup maple syrup in the text, but 1/2 cup syrup in the video! I used a full cup. It’s cooling now so I should be able to see how it turns out. It looks good and tastes good, albeit a bit crunchy! Alls well that ends well. Had great fun with it. Keep up the good work! — Alex from Big Lake, MN.
Can you please let me know the weight of the biscuits used in the base? I don’t believe we have that exact brand here in Australia. Also I believe (based on google search) that a stick of butter is 113g or half a cup – is this correct?
HI is there any chance you can put the weight for the graham crackers and the vegan butter? In Australia we have neither sticks or graham crackers, so I will use a substitute.
The only comment I have on it is… measurements are very American. Living in Europe graham crackers are really expensive and I’ve no clue what 2 envelopes of graham crackers weighs. This is important cos I need be able to weigh the closest things which are cookies called digestives. It would be great if you could post gram weights of everything as well. Including the can of chick peas. Believe it or not the entire world does not adhere to the weight of a can of chick peas in the states (-: For the rest I don’t mind cups and tsp. Most of the world has adapted using these measurements I guess since everyone has them or deals with it in some way.
Even 2 lemons can vary greatly depending on where you are. Probably better measuring that out as well. Think my “cheese cake ” came out too lemony due to this. I was able to muddle through the rest but I was stressing in the kitchen trying to cook dinner and snacks and then having to deal with looking up conversions to everything in the middle of what I thought would be pretty easy recipe.
To sum up when making a recipe measure everything so that everyone is on the same page to start with. 300 grams of something can be replaced but 2 envelopes…. Spent 10 minutes searching the net and never really got an answer I trusted.
Keep it up! I love the one can concept just needs to be a little more specific! You definitely got me experimenting with chickpeas again.
Wow..just wow. Make it, you won’t be disappointed.
Tastes amazing!!! How long does it stay in the fridge?
I am making this . I heard about your amazing chickpea cheesecake from Merles’ channel on youtube. Mine is also gluten free . I decided I had to make this for a New Year’s familia gathering. It is in the oven right now. Thank you!
I jumped straight to the recipe because I had heard such great things about this cheesecake and was very excited to make it. It was only when I got to the “grate the lemons” instruction that I was a little confused (it would have been more clear and accurate to say “zest” the lemons) so I went to the video for clarification. To my horror, in the video you say to add 1/2 cup of maple syrup….in the recipe you list the amount as 1 cup of maple. By that point it was all in the blender and the damage was done…I now have the cheesecake in the fridge cooling, and I’m just hoping it isn’t way too sweet. Perhaps a tart compote will help balance it out. Please fix this typo! I’ll probably try it again with just 1/2 cup of sweetness since I’ve heard such great things.
I am making this now. I had to substitute allulose for the maple syrup as my husband is diabetic. Really curious how it will come out! Do you think a package of firm tofu could replace the beans, using the aqua faba from the beans for the liquid? That would further reduce the carbs for him.
Dude I’m sorry, I love your videos, and have made a few burgers off of them, but this recipe does not align with what you showed on screen.
The recipe says an entire cup of maple syrup — The video says half. That’s quite a big discrepancy.
Also lemons — including juice? The recipe is unclear about that, so we ended up with a watery mess.
Love your stuff, but some attention to detail would be great.
Hey, as a note — the written recipe calls for a full cup of syrup, instead of half a cup. I caught it before blending but after adding a full cup of syrup to my blender 😅 might want to update that!
Please, could you tell how much 2 envelopes of graham crackers and 1 stick vegan butter would be in grams?
Looking forward to making this cake!
Is it possible to freeze the cheesecake?
Absolutely love this recipe! It’s incredible cheesecake. I LOVE baked cheesecake but want to move away from UPF and this is minimal!
One thing… I am in the UK and do not have access to Graham’s crackers, or have sticks of butter. Soo.. I went rouge and used loftus biscoff 200g (which I think was not enough) and 110g of butter. I did opt for oaties, and planned to do a half and half base – but my husband ate them all.
Can’t wait to make again!
Hello, how much gramms are 1 stick of Butter and one can of chickpeas?
In Germany the smallest can is 220 gr. I am looking forward to bake this cake 😃
Excellent!!
I’m making this today for a dinner party on Friday (two days from now) I’m crossing my fingers that it will stay fresh if I wrap it well and store in the fridge?
Hi! I made this recipe and it’s amazing. Have you had success with freezing it?
This recipe is the Bomb! I have made it twice now. The texture and flavor is outstanding! I substitute the maple syrup with dates, as I am diabetic and the dates seem to affect my blood sugar less. I have also been making your one can of chick peas pumpkin pie, I love it as well. Great job! Keep them coming!