This Vegan Spaghetti Squash Alfredo is the best of all vegan spaghetti squash recipes! It’s a comforting and healthy plant-based recipe that the whole family loves. Bonus, this easy vegan recipe is also gluten-free and low-carb, with only 12 grams of net carbs per serving.
If you like Alfredo Pasta, this baked spaghetti squash stuffed with dairy-free Alfredo Sauce will make you happy! This recipe is also gluten-free and a great recipe to eat more plants and swap regular pasta for more vegetables and fibers, a great alternative to pasta recipes like my Lemon Broccoli Green Pasta, Hidden Veg Pasta Sauce, or Cauliflower Pasta.
Ingredients and Substitutions
To make the recipe, you need:
- Spaghetti Squash – The base of the dish. If you can’t find spaghetti squash because they are not in season, it can be substituted with zucchini noodles for a quicker option.
- Vegan Butter – Adds richness. Light olive oil can be used as an alternative.
- Garlic – Fresh is best. Garlic powder can be used in a pinch, but reduce the quantity.
- All-Purpose Flour – Thickens the sauce. Arrowroot flour is a gluten-free alternative.
- Almond Milk – Use the unsweetened variety. Any plant-based milk can be substituted.
- Coconut Cream – This adds all the creaminess. Soy cream or cashew cream are good alternatives.
- Nutritional Yeast – Provides a cheesy flavor. There’s no direct substitute, but miso paste can add umami.
- Salt and Pepper – Adjust to taste.
- Ground Nutmeg – Optional, adds depth. Can be omitted or replaced with a pinch of cayenne for heat.
How To Make Vegan Spaghetti Squash
First, you need to cook the spaghetti squash. There are many ways you can cook a squash. Some people love to cook squash in a crockpot, microwave, or boil it. Here we bake the squash in the oven to add a lovely roasted flavor. The best way to cook the spaghetti squash is to bake it in an oven preheated to 350°F (180°C).
- First, cut the sides of the vegetable. Next, halve the squash lengthwise to end up with two ‘boats’.
- Scoop out the seeds from the vegetable using a spoon, discard the seeds or wash and keep them for later. You can roast the seeds to make crunchy appetizers.
- Then, cover a large baking sheet with parchment paper and place the two pieces of spaghetti squash, flesh down, onto the tray.
- Bake the squash for 30 to 45 minutes at 350°F (180°C) until it’s easy to prick the skin with a knife. The baking time varies depending on the size of your squash. If you overbake the squash, it won’t form noodles. Just a mushy soft puree.
- Check how it bakes as it goes. You know it’s almost ready to take out of the oven when the squash skin darkens to light brown, a knife can be inserted easily onto the tough skin, and the strands of the squash are yellow/golden but still firm if scraped with a fork.
- Remove the baked spaghetti squash halves from the tray and place them on a cooling rack or plate, flesh up.
- Set it aside for 15 minutes to let the steam come out.
- Then, use oven mittens to hold the squash with one hand, and with a fork, pull apt the flesh to form vegetable noodles.
- Place the noodles aside in a mixing bowl. You can keep the squash skins to refill later and use them as a dish, as seen in the picture. Or you can discard the squash skin and cook this recipe as a spaghetti squash casserole in a 9×13-inch baking dish.
- First, melt the vegan butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat.
- Then, add garlic and cook for 30 seconds until flavorsome.
- Remove from heat and, using a wooden spoon, stir in flour of choice until it forms a creamy yellowish paste.
- Return the saucepan over medium heat, whisk in unsweetened almond milk and coconut cream and keep cooking/whisking until it thickens and a light simmer forms. When the sauce has thickened, whisk in the nutritional yeast, chopped parsley, salt, and pepper.
- Keep cooking for 1 to 2 minutes until the yeast is well distributed. If the sauce is too thick for your liking, add 1/4 cup of unsweetened almond milk up to 1/2 cup for a more liquid sauce.
- Pour the sauce on the warm spaghetti squash noodles and serve immediately with fresh herbs and vegan Parmesan cheese.
Serving Suggestions
Pour the vegan alfredo sauce onto the vegetable noodle. Stir the noodles to evenly distribute the sauce over the spaghetti. Finally, place the alfredo squash noodles into a large baking dish or into the squash skins.
Sprinkle grated vegan cheese on top of the dish if desired and return to the oven for 15 minutes until it’s piping hot. Serve immediately with extra chopped parsley on top or a drizzle of garlic-infused olive oil.
Storage Instructions
This gluten-free, vegan squash casserole stores for up to 4 days in an airtight container in the fridge. Or you can freeze the container for up to 3 months. Rewarm in a saucepan or in the microwave until piping hot.
Expert Tips
- For easier cutting, microwave the whole squash for 3-5 minutes before halving.
- To prevent watery sauce, let spaghetti squash strands drain in a colander for a few minutes before mixing with sauce.
- Roast garlic cloves with the squash for a deeper, mellower garlic flavor in the sauce.
- For added protein, mix in some pan-fried tofu cubes or tempeh crumbles.
- Enhance the cheesy flavor by adding a tablespoon of white miso paste to the sauce.
- For a vegetable boost, stir in some steamed broccoli florets or sautéed mushrooms.
- Make the sauce ahead of time and reheat gently, adding a splash of plant milk if needed to thin it out.
- Experiment with different herbs like sage or thyme for variation in flavor profile.
- For a nut-free version, use oat milk instead of almond milk and omit the coconut cream, increasing the amount of flour slightly for thickness.
- Leftovers can be reheated in the oven for a crispy top, creating a sort of vegan Alfredo bake.
Frequently Asked Questions
Sure, you can bake a spaghetti squash and accommodate it with any regular vegan pasta sauce like marinara sauce, lentils Bolognese, or just vegan butter and salt for a simple low-carb side dish.
This happens if you overcook the spaghetti squash. In fact, to make vegetable noodles from spaghetti squash, the flesh must be cooked but still firm. You know the vegetable strands are cooked when:
– Their color switch from light yellow to golden yellow.
– They are easy to pull apart with a fork.
– The skin of the squash is dark/yellow.
Spaghetti Squash Nutrition
Spaghetti squash is a very low-carb vegetable, and it makes a delicious low-carb pasta replacement in vegan pasta recipes. It’s not only decreasing carbs of the recipe but also your calories with only 33 kcal per 100 grams. Plus, it’s adding fiber and micronutrients to your meal, including vitamin C and B6.
More Vegan Pasta Recipes
I love vegan pasta dishes as a quick and healthy plant-based dinner. Below I listed more vegan pasta recipes easy to make in 20 minutes or so.
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Vegan Spaghetti Squash Alfredo
Ingredients
- 1 Spaghetti Squash
Vegan Alfredo Sauce
- 3 tablespoons Dairy-Free Butter (Unsalted) - or light olive oil
- 4 cloves Garlic - crushed
- 3 tablespoons All-Purpose Flour - or arrowroot flour if gluten-free
- 1 ¼ cup Almond Milk
- ½ cup Coconut Cream - or soy cream
- ⅓ cup Nutritional Yeast
- ½ teaspoon Salt
- ¼ teaspoon Pepper
- 1 pinch Ground Nutmeg - – optional
- ¼ cup Chopped Parsley
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C).
- Using a sharp knife, trim the ends of the spaghetti squash. Discard.
- Stand the squash upright on a chopping board and cut the squash lengthwise to divide it in half.
- Using a scoop, scrape out the seeds from both squash halves. Discard the seeds.
- Cover a large baking sheet with parchment paper and place each half, flesh down onto the sheet.
- Bake for 30 – 40 minutes at 350°F (180°C), often checking to avoid overbaking the squash – this results in mushy flesh that won't create vegetable noodles.
- After 30 minutes, open the oven door and prick the squash skin with a knife. If it's tender, dark yellow/golden in color, it means the squash is cooked.
- Remove from the oven, use oven mittens to flip over the halves on the baking sheet. It's very hot and steams out a lot, so watch out! Try to pull apart the vegetable strands with a fork. If they loosen up easily, the squash is cooked. If they are hard to pull apart, or some still have a light yellow color, return to the oven.
- When cooked, let the halves flesh up on the baking sheet for 15 minutes until all the steam is out.
- When the vegetable has cool down, wear an oven mitten, hold one vegetable half with one hand and scrape the vegetable strands out of the vegetable skin with a fork.
- Set aside the vegetable noodles into a large mixing bowl. Keep the vegetable skins on the baking sheet for later if you intend to use them as a 'baking dish'. Meanwhile, prepare the vegan Alfredo Sauce.
Vegan Alfredo sauce
- In a medium saucepan, over medium heat, melt vegan butter or coconut oil. Stir in crushed garlic and remove the saucepan from heat.
- Using a wooden spoon stir in the flour into the melted butter until it forms a creamy yellow paste.
- Return saucepan over medium heat, whisk in almond milk and coconut cream.
- Keep cooking until the sauce thickens and a light simmer forms – light bubbles on the sides of the saucepan. It takes about 3-4 minutes.
- Now, stir in nutritional yeast, chopped parsley, salt, and pepper. The yeast thickens the sauce again. If too thick for you, stir in extra 1/4 cup almond milk.
- Return to medium heat for 1-2 minutes, stirring to distribute the yeast in the sauce. Add a pinch of nutmeg if desired.
- Pour the vegan alfredo sauce over the vegetable noodles and stir to combine evenly.
- Transfer the vegetable spaghetti into their original vegetable skins or into a large 9×13-inch baking dish.
- Sprinkle vegan cheese all over the dish if desired.
- Bake for 15-20 minutes until the sauce simmer and cheese is grilled/melted.
Storage
- Store in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 4 days or freeze for up to 3 months.
Looking to prepare a Thanksgiving dish for vegetarians, can the whole dish be baked?
The squash is baked and the whole dish is baked again with the sauce. Do you mean to ask if you can do the sauce not in a saucepan? If that’s your question, no, the sauce needs to be made on the stove
The sauce turned to a booger-y consistency with the arrowroot starch unfortunately. Are there other gluten free flours you’ve tried?
Cornstarch works very well
Super easy and delicious recipe
The taste of this is good, it just lacks a crunch. It’s very mushy and kind of reminds you of eating the inside of a pot pie without the shell. We added some walnuts and that helped a lot! Thanks for sharing ☺️
This is a gourmet dish !
OMG this Alfredo sauce was delicious
Along with the spaghetti squash!
It will be a # 1 in our house .
Thank you so much for sharing!
I would like to know if it can be made without the butter or oil , for someone that is oil free ?
Thanks for such a lovely feedback. You should be able to bind the bechamel without oil, I didn’t try yet, but I suppose it should work well.
That’s such a great idea! Thanks for sharing with me
This looks fabulous. Have to give it a go!