Creamy Cauliflower Buffalo Dip
Cauliflower, carrots, and more! This is a healthier take on cauliflower dip- a spicy cauliflower buffalo dip! It’s not laden with cheese and dairy, but is spicy, cooling, creamy, zingy, and delightful! Perfect for dipping chips, veggies, pita, and bread, as well as a topper for sandwiches, potatoes, and wraps. With just a quick boil of vegetables, and then a blend, you’ve got yourself some smooth, silky, vegan buffalo dip.
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What is Buffalo Sauce?
Buffalo sauce is often found in dips, but also on wings (chicken or cauliflower!), and any other application where dipping and smothering in sauce is appropriate- we’ve made a couple other buffalo-recipes, and linked them below. It is rich, creamy, spicy, tangy, and smooth. The main ingredients in buffalo sauce are hot sauce and oil or butter, blended together to add creaminess to the spicy sauce. Other ingredients are sometimes added, such as garlic, Worcestershire sauce, and more. Buffalo sauce and wings are a relatively new phenomenon, having first been made in Buffalo New York in the 1960’s. And for a while, the buffalo sauce stayed in Buffalo, but recently it’s become a widespread treat, enjoyed all across America and beyond.
Now one of the ingredients in buffalo sauce, the hot sauce, is a sort of vague term. Since buffalo sauce usually contains a pretty large amount of hot sauce, the type you use will make a big difference. If the hot sauce you choose is really hot, or has a distinct flavor (like mango), the buffalo sauce you make with that hot sauce will have those characteristics. For the most part, when people make buffalo sauce they use Frank’s Red Hot as the hot sauce. It’s been around since 1918, and is likely the hot sauce used in the first batch of buffalo wings. Frank’s is a fairly mild hot sauce, made with aged cayenne peppers, vinegar, salt, and garlic powder. It’s actually my favorite hot sauce for things like pizza, fries, and mac and cheese. And, of course, for buffalo flavored things.
This version of buffalo dip is a little healthier than your average buffalo dip, since the hot sauce is blended with cauliflower. It makes it creamy and smooth, and makes me feel totally justified in using this buffalo dip as a potato chip topper. Because life is about balance.
Looking for more Buffalo? Try one of these!
Looking to dip? Try one of these Vegan Dip Recipes!
- Thai Red Curry Sweet Potato Dip
- High-Protein Vegan French Onion Dip
- Creamy Vegan Nopales Dip
- Smokey Butternut Squash Hummus
- Vegan Dip with Roasted Peppers and Pumpkin Seeds
- Easy Cranberry Vinaigrette for Salads
- Simple Wild Garlic Recipe- Allium vineale Hummus
- Briny Summer Burdock Stalk Tapenade
- Zesty Vegan Kumquat Salsa Recipe
How to Make Cauliflower Buffalo Dip
Making your own dips tends to be pretty easy, and this one is no exception. There are two steps- boil, and blend. I could leave it there, but I’m going to give you a few more details. The main ingredient in this dip is cauliflower. We used half of a head of cauliflower, which ended up being about 12 ounces once we had removed the outer leaves. Please use the florets and the stalks for this recipe- it will all blend up well. Add some chopped carrots, onion, garlic, and cashews into a pot of water with the cauliflower, and get it going to a nice little simmer. You want to let the vegetables boil until the cauliflower and carrots are soft enough to be pierced with a fork. Once you’ve reached that point, go ahead and drain the liquid. After that, you can dump all the cooked vegetables and cashews in a blender, and add to it the remaining ingredients (hot sauce, olive oil, nutritional yeast, and salt and pepper). Blend them up until the dip is super creamy, and hey, you’re done! You can eat it slightly warm (which it will be once you’re done blending), let it cool to room temperature, or chill in the fridge. My favorite way to eat this dip is with potato chips, but I’ve also loved it on bread, sandwiches, with vegetables, tortilla chips, on baked potatoes, and more!
Creamy Cauliflower Buffalo Dip
Ingredients
- ½ cauliflower head (about 12 oz.)
- 1 medium-sized carrot
- ½ medium red onion
- 3 cloves garlic
- ½ cup cashew pieces
- ½ cup hot sauce (we used Frank’s Red Hot)
- ¼ cup olive oil
- 2 tbsp. nutritional yeast
- Salt and pepper, to taste
Instructions
- Cut the cauliflower into bite sized pieces- you can use the stalk, but remove the leaves. Cut the carrots into similar sized chunks, and quarter the onion. Remove the skins from the garlic. Add the cauliflower, carrots, cashews, onion, and garlic to a saucepan, and cover with water. Bring to a boil, and cook until the carrots and cauliflower are easily pierced with a fork.
- Drain the liquid, and add all the vegetables to a blender. And the remaining ingredients (the hot sauce, olive oil, nutritional yeast, and salt and pepper), and blend until smooth and creamy. Let chill to room temperature, and serve with vegetables or chips.
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