Vegan Stuffed Shells

Cheese is the one thing I have a hard time not eating.  When cutting back on cholesterol laden foods, cheese is a hard one to steer away from for me.  I saw this vegan recipe and it intrigued me into trying it.  I mean, "Nutritional Yeast" tastes like cheese???

And, what is it?  I never heard of it before I saw this recipe.  Being honest, I was highly skeptical...I picked it up at Famous Foods, though I read Whole Foods and places like that, have it too.  It was expensive, but it looks like I'll have more than enough if I want to experiment with it further.

I made homemade marinara sauce the night before so I could control the salt content.  I sauteed onions and some chili flakes in my sauce too.  I used my immersion blender to make it smooth.  It came out delicious and I was very, very happy with it.

I got the tofu ready first.  I only had 12 oz, not 16 like the recipe called for so thought I wouldn't stuff the shells full to make sure I had enough filling.

I pressed the water out first, and then added all the ingredients into the food processor.  I added fresh cracked pepper too but the recipe didn't.  It turned out looking pretty good when it came out and very much like ricotta cheese!

The spinach was thawed but still had some icy chunks in it, so I put it on tea towel and tried to wait until all the ice melted and then squeezed out as much liquid as I could.

A LOT of water came out - I had to use another tea towel.  I then mixed it into the tofu.

I boiled the shells next (cholesterol free), with salted water.

I salted the water after it boiled.  Chef Mario Batali has convinced me to do this with pasta, so it has the "salinity of the sea" as he says.  I drained and then set aside.  I preheated the oven.

I put some sauce in the baking dish and then started to stuff the shells when they were cool enough to touch.

I stuffed them with just enough so that I could close the seam when I put it in the dish.  The dish was sprayed with "Pam".

I placed them seam side down.  I poured the remaining marinara over and I couldn't help but think that all it was missing was cheese.  😊

There were leftover shells as below.

Next time I would double the tofu and stuff them really fat so I didn't waste anything.  I baked it in the oven for 30 minutes and it sure smelled good while it was in there!

My son's serving did get some grated Parmesan Reggiano on his.  I was fine to eat mine without and try the dish as presented in the recipe.  I garnished with some Italian parsley too.  Below, I flipped a shell and cut one open to show what it looked like on the inside.

Honestly, this was incredible - a show stopper!  I would not even know that it was tofu if I got it served to me.  Me, who loves cheese would never have been able to contest that it wasn't.  It was that good.  It blew our minds!!!  This definitely will be made again in our household!!!  What a luxurious dish, and to be Vegan and cholesterol free was just a bonus!