I’m trying to give up dairy. I’ve been trying to give up dairy for a while now but it always draws me back in, with it’s cheesy delightfulness. There is nothing wrong with dairy, in general, but it makes me feel sick so I should really try to avoid it when I can. In the process of giving up the dairy, I’ve been trying alternative things to replace milk, cream, butter & cheese in my cooking. Vary rarely do I have any of these things on their own, usually I’m mixing into something else so alternatives won’t be so horrible.

I’m avoiding straight up buying the fake cheese from Whole Foods as long as I can. That stuff does not look right but for my milk needs I find Coconut Milk to be great. It’s not overly coconutty and if you get it unsweetened then it’s pretty milk-like. Depending on what brand you get, the watery-ness varies. Silk sells the coconut milk in cartons if you’re looking for a drinking milk or cereal milk substitute. For cooking, I like the canned coconut milk. It’s usually thicker and if you get Thai kitchen brand, the coconut cream is very thick on top. This is a great sub for cream or milk in cooking.

Do you know what else is creamy??? Avocados! I love avocados very much and I like to add them to everything I can. I was about to go to sleep one night and suddenly a thought popped into my head, “Is avocado alfredo a thing?” I had to search the internet to find out and yes, it does. Kind of. I found this recipe and I thought I would riff on it with my own additions and methods. So here it is:

Avocado & Coconut Alfredo Sauce:

1/2 Onion
3 cloves of Garlic
Handful of sliced white Mushrooms
Salt
Olive Oil
1/2 cup fresh Basil
2 Avocados
1/2 can of Thai Kitchen Coconut Milk (14 oz size)
Food Processor

1. Dice onion, garlic & mushrooms. Saute them in in a pan with olive oil and pinch o’ salt. Saute until onions translucent and shrooms browned up a bit. Take off stove and set to the side.

2. Dice the basil. Put to the side.

3. Cut open the avocados and scoop the contents into the food processor. Add your onion mixture to the processor and pulse until everything is mostly pureed.

4. Add the coconut milk. The cream first then some of the water to make the mixture more sauce like.

5. Add the basil. Then process until smooth.

Done! Put it on things! Enjoy!

Additions: You could add a little lemon juice to keep the green color up. Maybe a little hot sauce for extra flavor. Fresh ground pepper? Whatever!