Vegan Mayonnaise

VG, GF.

Ooooh baby! I'm pretty excited about this one. Up until about 3 weeks ago Ben could tolerate a bit of cheese in his diet. I relied on it for school lunches as a "glue" to hold a white corn quesadilla together, or on top of a GF mini pizza. Things were swimming along and then in early September we all came down with the most aggressive stomach virus I've ever encountered. One unfortunate effect of that was that Ben can no longer tolerate dairy.

I'd heard about Vegenaise and Gwyneth raves about it in her book It's All Good. Could I find it here in Australia? No, I could not. As it turns out, vegan mayonnaise is actually easy to make. I used a recipe I adapted from Vegan Epicurean:

1/2 C soy milk (preferably unsweetened and not vanilla!)
1 C plus 2 Tbsp canola oil
1/4 tsp apple cider vinegar
1/4 tsp agave nectar
1/8 tsp dry mustard powder
3/4 tsp sea salt
1 Tbsp lemon juice
Zest of 1 lemon
Black pepper to taste

Put everything except the oil in a blender and give it a couple of pulses. Slowly add the oil while pulsing gently until it emulsifies and comes together in a nice thick mayonnaisy kind of way. The original recipe says to add everything and blend, but mine didn't thicken this way. It's important not to go crazy with the blender - gently, gently does it.

The taste? I like it. My first batch was a little too sweet for my taste so I would add less agave next time and more lemon. I can't wait to use this in a potato salad, on toast, or in a pasta salad. Enjoy!