Vegan cannelloni
Most vegan cannelloni fails in two predictable ways: a filling that tastes of nothing, and a top that comes out of the oven pale and wet. Both have specific fixes. Flavor comes from building the tang and salt of ricotta deliberately — miso, lemon and nutritional yeast — rather than hoping blended tofu passes on its own. Browning comes from an oiled breadcrumb topping, because cashew sauce, with almost no sugar-protein browning chemistry, will never gratin the way dairy does. Solve those two and the rest is the standard architecture every recipe on this site uses.
Ingredients
Tofu ricotta with spinach
- 400 g firm tofu (not silken) — pressed 20 minutes under a weighted plate; this step is the difference between ricotta texture and wet crumble
- 300 g frozen chopped spinach, thawed and squeezed hard (the towel-twist method from the classic recipe)
- 3 tbsp nutritional yeast · 1 tbsp white miso
- 2 tbsp lemon juice + zest of ½ lemon · 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 garlic clove, finely grated · ¼ tsp nutmeg · salt and pepper
Cashew béchamel
- 150 g raw cashews, soaked in boiling water 20 minutes
- 550 ml water or unsweetened soy milk (soy gives a richer sauce)
- 2 tbsp nutritional yeast · 1 tsp Dijon mustard · ¾ tsp salt
Assembly
- 12 egg-free dried cannelloni tubes (~250 g) — see the note below
- 400 ml tomato passata · 1 tbsp olive oil
- Topping: 2 tbsp fine dry breadcrumbs tossed with 1 tbsp olive oil and a pinch of salt
Are your tubes vegan? Most Italian dried cannelloni is plain durum semolina and water — vegan by default — but some brands add egg for sturdiness, so check the ingredients line, not the front of the box. Fresh sheets are almost always egg pasta. Our tubes guide covers how the brands differ.
Method
- Press and soak (20 min, passive). Set the tofu under a weighted plate to press, and cover the cashews with boiling water. Use the time to squeeze the spinach properly — it should lose about a third of its thawed weight.
- Tofu ricotta. Crumble the pressed tofu into a food processor with the nutritional yeast, miso, lemon juice and zest, olive oil, garlic, nutmeg, ½ tsp salt and pepper. Pulse to the texture of ricotta — grainy-creamy, not smooth hummus. (No processor? Mash thoroughly with a fork; the texture is slightly coarser and entirely fine. With one, it’s 30 seconds — our picks.) Fold in the chopped spinach and taste: it should be tangy and savory enough to eat on toast. Adjust salt and lemon until it is.
- Cashew béchamel. Drain the cashews and blend with the water or soy milk, nutritional yeast, Dijon and salt until completely smooth — a full 60–90 seconds in a jug blender; any grit now is grit in the finished dish. Pour into a pan and simmer, whisking, 3–4 minutes: cashew starch thickens fast. Stop at pourable-coating consistency — it thickens further in the oven, and a too-thick sauce leaves the pasta undercooked.
- Tomato base. Simmer the passata with the olive oil and a pinch of salt for 10 minutes; spread it over the base of a 9×13 dish.
- Assemble. Pipe the filling into the tubes (~40 g each; methods in the filling guide), arrange in one snug layer, and cover every surface with the cashew béchamel. Scatter the oiled breadcrumbs evenly — they are the browning layer, so aim for full coverage.
- Bake. 190°C / 375°F: 25 minutes covered with foil, then 10–15 uncovered until the crumbs are deep gold and the edges bubble. Rest 10 minutes.
Why this browns when other vegan bakes don’t
Dairy béchamel browns because milk proteins and lactose caramelize. Cashew sauce has neither in useful amounts, so recipes that just swap sauces produce a beige top no matter how long you bake — and longer baking only dries the pasta. Putting the browning job onto olive-oil breadcrumbs (plus the yeast-and-mustard savor in the sauce itself) gets you a proper crust at the same bake time as the dairy version. A handful of shredded vegan mozzarella under the crumbs works too if you like the stretch; it’s optional, not structural.
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Make ahead
Everything here tolerates time well: the filling and both sauces keep 48 hours refrigerated, and the assembled dish freezes unbaked for 3 months — cashew béchamel survives freezing better than dairy, with no splitting on reheat. Timings in the freezing guide.
Frequently asked questions
Which cannelloni tubes are vegan?
Most Italian dried tubes are just durum wheat semolina and water, which is vegan — but some brands add egg, so read the ingredients list on the box rather than assuming. Fresh pasta sheets nearly always contain egg.
Can I make the cashew béchamel nut-free?
Yes — make a classic roux béchamel with 50 g olive-oil margarine, 50 g flour and 650 ml unsweetened soy milk, seasoned with the same nutritional yeast, Dijon and salt. Soy milk behaves closest to dairy in a roux; oat milk works but browns faster.
Does the miso make the filling taste Japanese?
No — one tablespoon of white miso reads as depth and salt, not as miso. It's doing the job that aged cheese does in the dairy version: glutamates. If you don't have it, add an extra tablespoon of nutritional yeast and a bit more salt.