The EASIEST Classic Creamy Vegan Cheesecake – No Tofu, No Cashews!
This ultra creamy and rich vegan cheesecake tastes JUST like classic New York baked cheesecake, and it only needs 7 ingredients (NO tofu, no cashews though!). And it’s SO easy to make with my simple steps to ensure you get the creamiest and perfectly tangy vegan cheesecake ever!
A classic New York-style cheesecake- made vegan:
Truly. It took me years to develop an amazing baked vegan cheesecake that tastes just like a slice of classic cheesecake: super rich, ultra creamy, decadent, and just sweet with the perfect tang. Rich, like New York cheesecake, but made at home, and all without eggs and dairy.
And make it easy, too.
Plus you don’t need to soak any cashews beforehand nor prep any tofu. This vegan cheesecake is made entirely without cashews, tofu, nor coconut cream, and the result is ultra velvety, creamy, and lush. And we’re only using 7 simple ingredients too!
What I love most about this recipe, from a recipe developer’s standpoint , is that it can now be used as the base recipe for other cheesecakes. In fact, it’s inspired some of my most popular cheesecake recipes, including my caramel cheesecake, cannoli cheesecake, tiramisu cheesecake, and pistachio cheesecake!
The only 7 ingredients you need:
- Vegan cream cheese: Many vegan cream cheese do use nuts, I am aware of this. That’s why I made my 3-ingredient homemade vegan cream cheese that’s NUT FREE and soy free. For store bought, I personally love Tofutti and it works wonderfully in this recipe. However, for my soy-free readers, I have tried this cheesecake with Kite Hill and it is a DREAM!
- Dairy free yogurt: You can use your favorite here (mine is Forager Project); whether it’s oat milk yogurt, cashew milk, coconut yogurt, soy milk yogurt, or almond. Using dairy free yogurt also helps us to replace the silken tofu found in other vegan cheesecake recipes, and lemon juice.
- Vegan heavy cream: Most classic cheesecake recipes don’t use heavy cream, but I’ve found in my testing, vegan heavy cream helps to really set beautifully with the cornstarch to add an extra richness and slightly denser mouth feel that comes with traditional cheesecake.
- Cornstarch: Our other egg replacement here that helps everything beautifully set! You can also use arrowroot starch.
- Sugar: I used organic granulated sugar here. Be sure that your sugar is truly vegan. I always personally use Florida Crystals Sugar for that reason. They’re also minimally processed!
- Vanilla extract: Sub in vanilla powder if you’d prefer!
- Graham cracker crust: This homemade graham crackers and vegan butter to achieve a deliciously buttery vegan gluten free graham cracker crust! You could also sub in melted coconut oil for the vegan butter if you’d prefer!
Why we’re using cold vegan heavy cream and room temperature vegan cream cheese
This is crucial for making a fluffy vegan cheesecake that looks and tastes like the classic.
Room temperature cream cheese will help the cream cheese integrate into all the remaining ingredients much more easily. Cold vegan cream cheese, like traditional cream cheese, clumps very easily and won’t cream into other ingredients.
However, cold vegan heavy cream will help create volume in our cheesecake. Since cream integrates easily into ingredients warm or cold, this isn’t a concern here. But cold heavy cream, like when making whipped cream, will thicken and aerate, which will help give our cheesecake a bit of volume while baking!
Step-by-step how to make my classic homemade vegan cheesecake recipe:
For the full written instructions and ingredient measurements, see the bottom of this post in the recipe card. You can also hit the “jump to recipe” button at the top of this post! Here, we’ll go over a brief overview of the steps, along with providing visuals for a better understanding of the recipe.
Step 1: The vegan cheesecake crust
Must like a traditional crust, you’ll just blitz together the graham crackers into a fine crumb, then mix in the melted vegan butter.
Press into the pan and up the sides of the wall before baking. While the crust is baking, we’ll make the filling and boil the water for the water bath.
Step 2: The vegan cheesecake filling
When developing this recipe, I’ve tried several different methods, including just using a food processor (originally, this was my go-to method). And while the cheesecake will still taste lovely with a food processor, you really get that airy, velvety texture when you use a stand mixer or hand mixer.
So this is the method I recommend going forward, which is very similar to making a traditional cheesecake!
- Mix: You’ll add the cream cheese into the bowl of a stand mixer or large bowl and cream until fluffy. Then add in the remaining ingredients, save for the heavy cream, and mix again to incorporate. Finally, we’ll pour in the vegan heavy cream and whisk again until fluffy.
- Pour: Next, pour the cheesecake mixture over the crust.
- Create the water bath: Pour boiling water into a baking sheet with walls or casserole dish, placing it on the lower rack of the oven.
- Bake: Place your vegan cheesecake onto the middle rack. Close your oven quickly to prevent anymore heat from escaping.
- Cool in the oven: Once baked, allow your vegan cheesecake to cool in the oven to 10 minutes. Then remove the cheesecake to cool at room temperature for 15 minutes.
- Setting time: Place your room temperature vegan cheesecake into the fridge to set for 4-6 hours, or until not wobbly anymore.
- Serve and enjoy!
A note on the wiggliness of your cheesecake once baked:
When you stop the cheesecake from baking initially, it will still wiggle. You will THINK it’s not baked fully, but I can assure you that it is! This is why you need to let the cheesecake set overnight. As it sets overnight, the ingredients will cool and solidify, allowing the cornstarch to set and thicken as well.
My easy trick for a water bath:
Instead of a traditional water bath, in which you would wrap the bottom of the pan in tinfoil and submerge the pan in boiling water while it bakes, I have an easier, more beginner-friendly method!
Cheesecakes love moisture, and ovens unfortunately zap moisture. So to ensure we still have a moist environment for our cheesecake to bake in, we’ll place a large casserole dish of boiling water on the bottom rack of the oven and place the cheesecake on the middle rack as it bakes. While the cheesecake bakes, the boiling water will evaporate into the oven, but there’s no need to submerge your cheesecake into water!
Why we’re cooling the cheesecake in an OFF oven at first:
This is a crucial step to baking your cheesecake. Once the cheesecake has baked, we’ll turn the oven off, but crack the oven to allow the cheesecake to cool. This will allow the cheesecake to cool slowly rather than being shocked from a super hot environment to a much cooler one (also preventing any cracking!).
This is what happens if you cool a cheesecake immediately from the oven to room temperature:
The cheesecake will begin to pull away from the edges of the pan (which is why it’s super important to line the walls of your cheesecake pan as well!). Then we’ll cover it and refrigerate overnight so that it thickens and sets!
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The Easiest Vegan Cheesecake – No Tofu, No Cashews!
- Prep Time: 15
- Chill Time: 240
- Cook Time: 65
- Total Time: 5 hours 20 minutes
- Yield: 16 1x
- Category: Cheesecake
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
- Diet: Vegan
Description
This ultra creamy and rich vegan cheesecake tastes JUST like classic New York baked cheesecake, and it only needs 7 ingredients (NO tofu, no cashews though!). And it’s SO easy to make with my simple steps to ensure you get the creamiest and perfectly tangy vegan cheesecake ever!
Ingredients
Vegan Graham Cracker Crust:
- 18 sheets or 1 batch (300 g) vegan graham crackers or Lotus Biscoff Cookies
- 1/2 cup (113 g) melted vegan butter
Vegan Cheesecake Filling:
- 32 ounces vegan cream cheese, room temperature
- 1 cup (240 g) dairy free yogurt or dairy free sour cream, room temperature
- 1 cup (240 mL) vegan heavy cream, cold
- 1 cup (200 g) granulated sugar
- 9 tbsp (90 g) cornstarch or arrowroot starch
- 1 tbsp vanilla extract
- 3–4 cups boiling water, for water bath
- Fresh strawberries, for topping
Instructions
- Prep: Line a 9-inch springform pan with parchment paper. Grease the edges of the pan with a bit of cooking or coconut oil as well, and line with parchment paper. Preheat the oven to 400F. Bring 3-4 cups of water to a boil while you make the recipe (for the water bath).
- Make the crust: Add the graham crackers or cookies to a food processor, and pulse until you reach a fine crumb. Then add in the melted vegan butter, and pulse again until you get a wet crumb. Press the cookie crumbs into the bottom of your cheesecake pan, working up the sides of the pan as well. Place the pan into the oven to bake for 7 minutes. Once baked, remove from the oven.
- Important: Reduce the oven temperature to 325F.
- Make the cheesecake filling: In a stand mixer with whisk attachment, or large bowl with hand mixer, cream the cream cheese until fluffy, about 2-3 minutes. Add in the dairy free yogurt, sugar, vanilla extract, and cornstarch. Cream together again until smooth. Then pour in the vegan heavy cream and whisk again for about 2-3 minutes to integrate. Scrape the bottom and edges of the bowl in between mixing to ensure everything is incorporated. Pour the cheesecake filling into the springform pan, and smooth the top. Place the cheesecake pan onto a baking sheet.
- Create the water bath: Place a large casserole dish onto the low rack of the oven. Pour the boiling water into the casserole dish. Close the oven door.
- Bake the cheesecake: Place the cheesecake baking sheet onto the middle rack and quickly close the oven to bake for 75 minutes, or until the the top of the cheesecake lightly golden. The center is set but still wiggly. Once baked, turn off the oven, and keep the cheesecake in the oven but crack the oven door. Allow the cheesecake to sit in the oven for 1 hour. The cheesecake will still be a bit wiggly. This is completely fine and should be that way. This cheesecake will not seem cooked at all when you first turn off the oven.
- Chill the cheesecake: Remove the cheesecake from the oven and allow the cheesecake to cool at room temperature for 15 minutes. Then cover and place the cheesecake into the fridge to chill for 4 hours, or overnight.
- Serve and enjoy! When ready to serve, top with fresh berries, cherries, or jam, and enjoy! Store any leftover cheesecake in an airtight container and in the fridge for up to 4 days.
Equipment
Buy Now → Notes
Cornstarch Starch: make sure that your cornstarch or arrowroot starch (also called powder) is stored properly and is still active. Improperly stored or expired arrowroot will not work. You can also swap in an equal amount of cornstarch.
Vegan heavy cream: If you can do cashews, you can use cashew cream.
Water bath: Using a water bath is extremely important for a moist cheesecake! Please see blog post for all tips.
Gluten free: Swap in gluten free vegan graham crackers or gluten free homemade biscoff cookies!
Please read the above blog post for all tips & tricks on how to make this baked vegan cheesecake, as well as watch the quick YouTube tutorial! Thank you!
Hi Brit, thank you for all your wonderful vegan recipes!
you mention vegan milk in the description for the filling, but it’s not listed in the ingredients, only the yoghurt, cream cheese and heavy cream. how much milk should be added to the filling? thank you so much in advance, can’t wait to try this recipe!!!
Hi Michelle! Sorry for the confusion! We have updated the recipe and vegan milk is no longer needed. 🙂 Enjoy
Made it for my coworker’s birthday. It came out great! Texture and consistency is right on. I’ll definitely be making this again!
Just a note:
When reading the recipe, you have a heavy cream in the ingredients with no reference to a milk, but in the instructions you use the term milk with no reference to a cream. I was confused about this for a minute and kept wondering if something was missing. I ended up going all the way back through the post until I saw where you had talked about the milk and how you could also use a cashew cream INSTEAD. It could be super helpful if in the ingredients it could say “milk OR cashew cream”.
Thank you for this recipe!
Hi Michael! WOW! This turned out beautifully and looks so delish! I am so sorry for the confusion with the ingredients and will update the recipe ASAP!
Best cheesecake recipe I’ve tried! The texture is perfect. I used Tofutti cream cheese and Violife sour cream. It did look weird toward the end of baking-it got oily and liquidy around the edges, but was fine once it cooled down. The texture and taste are perfect. I made it with oat pecan crust and apple caramel topping.
When Britt says use a springform pan, she wasn’t kidding. I didn’t use one, used a pie plate instead, which wasn’t deep enough. My lovely cheesecake just went over in the oven, the drippings started smoking, and the entire thing is ruined. My fault for not reading the directions thoroughly until I was in a remote kitchen without a springform pan. I’m so sad! It seemed like a lovely start to a great cheesecake.
Hi Laura! So sorry this didn’t work for you! Unfortunately, the springform pan is essential when making cheesecake. I do hope you’ll give it another go! 🙂
Hi, just jumping into say, for the love of god, make this cake! I made this cheesecake, with the ingredients exactly as listed but completely fumbled my way through the baking process, like opening the oven door for the cake to cool but forgetting to turn the oven off (: (I do not recommend multi-tasking half a dozen things while baking!) and yet it turned out absolutely fantastic!
I imagine because of the whole oven thing, my cheesecake developed a dry film like cover on the surface of the cake, but leaving it in the fridge overnight cleared that right up, (just mentioning in case anyone else sees a film on their cake, its not a problem). I served it a family birthday party with a berry coulis and everyone adored it! Mind you no one else in my family is vegan and I would say they’re skeptical of the whole idea at best, and yet they couldn’t stop devouring this cake! Creamy, rich, and somehow perfectly balanced between light and indulgent. This is the best baked cheese cake I’ve found and will definitely be making it again in the future
Can I cook this recipe in an instant pot ? I have made regular cheesecake this way and it comes out perfect every time.
Hi Debbie! We haven’t personally used an Instant Pot for this recipe, so I can’t guarantee how it would turn out, sorry about that! Let us know how it goes if you decide to try it!
Your recipe sounds great, can’t wait to try it. Just wondering if I wanted to add lemon juice would I need to change amount of any other ingredient?
Hi Lorraine! So sorry for the delay! So are you trying to achieve a lemon flavor? If so, you can check out our vegan lemon cheesecake! It’s so good and super lemony!
Just wondering if this is the same as the Unbelievably Silky Baked Vegan Cheesecake Recipe.
TIA
Yes it is!
Hi Britt, can’t wait to try this recipe. I was wondering if I could substitute the cane for date sugar.
Will right a comment after I baked it.
Also I made the cream cheese recipe using chilled shelf stable WestSoy milk and it turned out absolutely delicious, great consistency and taste!
Thanks for sharing your recipes.
I would actually recommend granulated maple sugar or coconut sugar over date sugar- I find when you add liquid to the date sugar, it stiffens too much, and I worry your cheesecake might not be creamy enough!
I swear Britt, all your recipes are SO GOOD!! This time I made a bicoff flavoured baked cheesecake as a welcome home dessert for my grandmother and it was super delicious! My whole family of 6 people went vegan this year when we learned about the animal harm and your recipes are always there when we need the perfect sweet treat. I swear on my life that your cheesecake recipes are better than any non- vegan cheesecakes I’ve ever had. Thank you so much for putting in the time to make these recipes! They are true miracles ❤️
This is so amazing 🙂 WOW! Thank you so so much for this kind review!! And thank you so much for being here- really and truly means the world!! ENJOY!!
I am not sure how soon you will see this but would it still work if I to use the “silk” vanilla DF soy milk yogurt or the Kite hill plain unsweet almond milk yogurt?
Hi Eva! Yes you totally can!! Enjoy 🙂
Okay Thank you!!! You’re seriously amazing for your fast response and a life saver will be posting the finished result!
Oh absolutely!! Seriously can’t wait to see the finished result 🙂 ENJOY!!
Hi! made this over the weekend and was OBSESSED!! was wondering how i can adjust it to add biscoff flavor on the inside?
LOVE IT!! Oh I would check out my no bake biscoff cheesecake, unless, did you want it to be baked?
Yes! want it to be baked 🙂
Hi Abby so sorry I’m just responding!! So to do this, you’d swap out 1/2 cup of the dairy free yogurt (so do a total of 1/2 (113 g) dairy free yogurt) and add 1 cup (220 g) biscoff Lotus cookie butter 🙂 That’s it! Enjoy!!
I made a Sunday dessert that was a traditional cheesecake. My son with food allergies saw it and really wanted to try a dairy and egg free version for himself. (He is also allergic to all nuts, banana and mango). We made this cheesecake recipe and it was delicious! We used dairy free sour cream. We cut the recipe in half since he was the only one eating it and it still made a great 8in cheesecake!
IMG_0798
Amazing!!! So so happy to hear this, I LOVE using the vegan sour cream!! Enjoy!!
Hi! does this freeze well?
Yes it does!
This is how my cheesecake looked after baking for 55 minutes having used a water bath!? Buying an oven thermometer to see if my oven cooks hot.
Despite the top appearing overcooked, the insides were still jiggly as you mentioned they should be. It’s just disappointing when you have such high hopes for a recipe. I will be trying again!
Hi there! This actually looks perfect to me!! From here, you would just need to chill it for a few hours 🙂 It will firm up beautifully! Cheesecakes, vegan or not, are never set when they come out of a hot oven. Let it cool, and I bet it will slice beautifully!
Thank you for your response. It did slice up beautifully, and it tasted delicious.
My concern was the bumpy topping, which I perceived as an error. Your cheesecake top looks smooth. Any theories on how my cheesecake top can be smooth like yours?
Oh got it! I’m so sorry I misunderstood! So that sometimes happens if the ingredients are not all room temperature OR overtaxing, but most likely it was due to maybe the cream cheese being still cold or the heavy cream!
Good call! I had the cream cheese and yogurt at room temp, but not the heavy cream. I will be making this cheesecake again in a few days. Thank you for your help!
Oh that’s wonderful!! Yes please definitely let me know!! Also what cream cheese brand are you using? I think that the violife and tofutti can sometimes puff up too which would cause a crinkle on top!
I used the Violife brand. Which brand do you prefer?
That could be part of the reason, sometimes Violife acts funny because it’s very heavily coconut oil based! But I’m so glad it’s working for you for the most part! I usually use Tofutti or my vegan homemade cream cheese (which is pea protein based!)!
This looks Awesome! The only set back for me would be the cost of making this. Vegan cream cheese, sour cream, and yogurt in my area is super expensive. 4 x 8 oz vegan cream cheese packages alone would cost me approx. $24 plus.
Sadly, at that price, I may as well pay $10 for the Daiya brand packaged cheesecake.
Sorry.
Hi Patricia!! Oh my gosh, I feel the same way- vegan cream cheese is absurd these days. I’ve honestly been making my own vegan butter (to come, working on a special project with it) and vegan cream cheese because that’s been better for me. It’s more work, but can be worth it. I hope that helps, but either way, I completely understand!! It’s crazy these days, I stopped buying because it’s so frustrating!
Wow wow wow! I’m so glad I found your site. This is the second recipe I’ve made from you and my first attempt ever at a cheesecake (vegan or not). I used the violife cream cheese, forager yogurt & silk heavy cream. I over baked it a bit just because I wasn’t prepared for how liquidy it would still appear after baking (even though you made that very clear but I still thought “no way this is done” and left it in another 10 minutes). Now I know. Because of overbaking I ended up trimming the top and the edges and right underneath the outer layer was perfect. I made a quick strawberry sauce with some strawberries, agave & sugar, for the top and got rave reviews. I can’t wait to make this again. After what I learned this round it will be even better.
Oh my goodness, I’m just so grateful you’re here!! So so happy that you loved it!! Thank you so much for the review 🙂 And glad to have you here! Enjoy!!
Hello!
The only heavy cream I could find at my local store was this oat heavy whipping cream, do you think this will work in place of the heavy cream? I’m really hoping this turns out well. I have a coconut yogurt im going to use along with the tofutti cream cheese
Hi Dani! No worries! I’m actually curious what the ingredients are for this- is it shelf-stable or refrigerated? Companies usually are aware that their customers will be swap their products for every use that they would use for a standard ingredient, so in theory it should work. But I can’t guarantee it as I don’t know the brand nor ingredients!
This looks absolutely amazing! The recipe is so well explained and the step-by-step process makes it really easy to follow. I love how you’ve created a vegan version without losing the creamy, rich cheesecake texture. Definitely a must-try for dessert lovers. Thanks for sharing such a great recipe!
Have you ever tried subbing Maple Syrup for the Sugar?
Do you reduce the amount of cream to balance the amount of liquid?
Thanks!
Yes!! So subbing in maple syrup gets tricky- I would actually recommend subbing in granulated maple sugar (which is just maple syrup that’s been crystallized) because that is just a 1:1 swap with the granulated cane sugar. I hope that helps!