Dairy-free cheesecake seems like an oxymoron, but we’ve figured out the formula! This version is a perfectly light, yet creamy cheesecake that serves as a great canvas for any fruit or chocolate toppings your heart desires.
I have instructions in this recipe for how to top the cake with oranges and a delicious orange syrup, but you could also make Sarah’s glazed strawberries or use any other fruit you like.
All without the digestive havoc that dairy can wreak on we less fortunate lactose-intolerant folk!
A Whole New World: Dairy-Free Baking
A few years ago, I found myself victim to a particularly lazy digestive system when it comes to dairy. I still enjoy my sneaky share of cheese every now and again, but I feel much better when I avoid it, and I’ve begun sniffing out recipes for my favorite foods. Recipes that taste just as good with dairy substitutes!
This dairy-free cheesecake is one of them. In the past, I’ve also made a dairy-free Lemon Cake and Vegan Chocolate Peanut Butter Silk Tart. (I also have plans for a chocolate pudding pie, so stay tuned!)
The Best Dairy-free Cream Cheese for Cheesecake
The pressing question on everyone’s minds! In my opinion, tofu products are the best in the game for dairy-free baking. Whether it’s silken tofu or tofu cream cheese, those are my go-to’s for dairy-free baking. The flavors are mild, and they hold up better than nut milks and cheeses.
I’m also a big fan of oat milk, which I use in this recipe instead of dairy milk! Oat milk has all the body and flavor you miss in milk without the weird separation that can happen with almond milk or soy milk. That said, you can experiment with your favorite plant-based milk and report back in the comments!
NOTE: for the crust, I used butter, because butter has very low lactose content. It’s okay for me personally, but for a truly dairy-free cheesecake, use vegan butter / margarine or coconut oil as described in the recipe.
Is This Recipe Vegan?
This recipe contains eggs and butter, which means it is NOT vegan. However, if you substitute flax eggs and vegan butter, margarine, or coconut oil, you can easily make this a vegan recipe. It may bake up slightly differently without the help of the regular chicken eggs, so keep that in mind as you monitor baking times.
Now, for anyone following the thread from my Spicy Hunan Steamed Tofu and Mushrooms, I did originally set out to make a VEGAN cheesecake, and while this version isn’t vegan, I like it much better, because it’s much tastier and truer to a classic cheesecake. No-bake versions out there that rely on the freezer and complicated (and expensive) nut crusts take a lot of effort and just…taste too healthy.
So there’re 2 eggs that snuck into this recipe, but if we’re talking about the carbon/health impact of two eggs, that’s a heck of a lot better than 2 eggs + 3 packs of cream cheese so I’ll take small wins where I can get them, thank ya very much!
Let’s bake!
Dairy-Free Cheesecake Recipe Instructions
Make the cake:
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease a 9-inch springform pan and wrap the bottom in foil (you’re going to be putting the cheesecake in a water bath, and you don’t want the water to seep into the pan from the bottom).
Break up the graham crackers into smaller pieces and put them in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse until they’ve turned into crumbs. Add the melted vegan butter and process again until the mixture resembles wet sand. Press evenly into the bottom of the springform pan, packing the crumbs down as tightly as you can.
In the bowl of a mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, add the tofu cream cheese and mix on low speed until light and creamy. Add the sugar and mix on low speed until smooth.
Blend in the oat milk on low speed as well. Add in the eggs one at a time, mixing just until incorporated. Then mix in the vanilla, lemon zest, cinnamon, salt, and flour.
Do not over-mix or allow too much air into the mixture.
Pour the filling into your prepared crust. Tap the pan against the counter a few times to get rid of any air bubbles, and place it in a rimmed baking sheet filled with 1 cm of water.
Transfer the entire apparatus to the oven and bake for 20 minutes, then lower the heat to 275F and bake for 50 minutes more. Do not open the oven door! After the baking time has elapsed, turn the heat off and let cool in the oven for 2 hours (this allows the cake to cool gradually and prevents cracking).
Make the glaze and fruit topping:
Meanwhile, make the mandarin orange syrup. In a small saucepan, add the water and sugar. Bring to a simmer, stirring frequently. Simmer for 3 minutes, until the sugar is completely dissolved.
Dissolve the cornstarch in the juice of 1 mandarin orange, and pour it into the pot, stirring constantly. Strain through a fine-meshed strainer (to remove any large bits of pulp or seeds) and transfer back into the pot. Simmer until the syrup is bubbly, no longer foamy, and thickened. Remove the syrup from the heat, and allow to cool completely.
When the cheesecake has cooled completely, brush the cooled syrup on top of the cake.
Arrange the orange slices over the top. I used both a small navel orange and a mandarin orange, to get the two-toned citrus look you see on the cake.
Brush the oranges liberally with more syrup.
And serve!
Again, you can top this cheesecake with strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, cherries, or even chocolate!
Dairy-free Cheesecake
Ingredients
For the crust:
- 16 graham crackers (240g)
- 6 tablespoons vegan butter (melted; any vegan butter/margarine of choice or coconut oil, 85g)
For the filling:
- 20 ounces tofu cream cheese (such as Tofutti - 675g, 2 1/2 eight ounce packages)
- 2/3 cup granulated sugar (135g)
- 1/3 cup oat milk (or other plant-based milk, 80 ml)
- 2 eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- zest of 1 lemon
- 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 2 tablespoons all purpose flour (18g)
For the orange syrup and topping:
- 1/4 cup water (60 ml)
- 1/4 cup granulated sugar (35g)
- 1 teaspoon cornstarch
- juice of 1 mandarin orange or clementine
- 1-2 mandarin oranges (supremed and cut crosswise into 1/4-inch slices)
Instructions
Make the cake:
- Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease a 9-inch springform pan and wrap the bottom in foil (you’re going to be putting the cheesecake in a water bath, and you don’t want the water to seep into the pan from the bottom).
- Break up the graham crackers into smaller pieces and put them in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse until they’ve turned into crumbs. Add the melted butter and process again until the mixture resembles wet sand. Press evenly into the bottom of the springform pan, packing the crumbs down as tightly as you can.
- In the bowl of a mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, add the tofu cream cheese and mix on low speed until light and creamy. Add the sugar and mix on low speed until smooth. Blend in the oat milk on low speed as well. Add in the eggs one at a time, mixing just until incorporated. Then mix in the vanilla, lemon zest, cinnamon, salt, and flour. Do not over-mix or allow too much air into the mixture.
- Pour the filling into your prepared crust. Tap the pan against the counter a few times to get rid of any air bubbles, and place it in a rimmed baking sheet filled with 1 cm of water.
- Transfer the entire apparatus to the oven and bake for 20 minutes, then lower the heat to 275F and bake for 50 minutes more. Do not open the oven door! After the baking time has elapsed, turn the heat off and let cool in the oven for 2 hours.
Make the glaze and fruit topping:
- Meanwhile, make the mandarin orange syrup. In a small saucepan, add the water and sugar. Bring to a simmer, stirring frequently. Simmer for 3 minutes, until the sugar is completely dissolved.
- Dissolve the cornstarch in the juice of 1 mandarin orange, and pour it into the pot, stirring constantly. Strain through a fine-meshed strainer (to remove any large bits of pulp or seeds) and transfer back into the pot. Simmer until the syrup is bubbly, no longer foamy, and thickened. Remove the syrup from the heat, and allow to cool completely.
- When the cheesecake has cooled completely, brush the cooled syrup on top of the cake. Arrange the orange slices over the top, and brush liberally with more syrup.
Tips & Notes:
nutrition facts
Oh, yay! I have recently become lactose-intolerant. I also am interested in a low-carb diet, and one of its mainstays is cheesecake. I was thinking that I might have to make my own cream cheese from lactose-free milk. This sounded time-consuming, so put off experimentation. Now you have given me not only a great recipe but also the clues that I need to proceed on a low-carb, lactose-free cheesecake! Thank you!
The only reason why I haven’t rated this recipe is because I haven’t yet tried it, and I hate it when people rate untried recipes.
Jean B.
Hurrah!!! Sounds like perfect timing, Jean :D Let us know how you like it!
I have used several of your recipes and just about all of them have been successful. This one I cheated on and used Cream Cheese/Marscapone. It came out beautiful. Very pleased indeed.
VANDA
Thank, you Vanda!! Glad you enjoyed it :)
Wow looks great! I’ll have to give it a try. I can also share a super easy dairy-free pie that can be made in literally five minutes, this is my mom’s old recipe: Blend one box of soft tofu (drained) with one packet of jello (any flavor you like) dissolved in the right amount of hot water according to package instructions. Pour that whole thing into one of those store bought graham cracker pie crusts and just chill it. That’s it! The gelatin will solidify the filling and you got yourself a nice tofu pie. Can also be low carb if you use sugar free jello. This has saved me on more than one potluck occasion!
Hi Matt, interesting idea! Tofu pie…I’ll be thinking about the possibilities for this one…! Thanks for the tip.
Hi Kaitlin,
Thank you for posting this recipe! I also have difficulty digesting dairy so I appreciate this type of recipe. I prefer a cheesecake that is more on the tangy side and not too sweet. How does this one turn out?
Hi Sarah, This recipe is definitely not too sweet, as we don’t like our desserts overly sweet as a general rule. You can try reducing the sugar further, or leaving off the syrup topping to help up the tanginess. Generally, the tang comes from the cream cheese, so that’s one thing to keep in mind.
There is eggs and butter in the recipe so I wouldn’t call this dairy free. It is misleading. Maybe call it “low dairy” but certainly not “dairy free”.
Yes, i agree. But a good reminder that on products labeled Diary Free that does NOT necessarily mean vegan.
(Im not vegan but vegetarian- but labels can be tricky!)
Thanks, Joe. The simple add of using vegan butter/margarine or coconut oil makes it dairy-free, it just so happens that we used butter the day of blogging.
Also, eggs are not dairy! They’re just next to the dairy aisle.
:)
I don’t think I’ll be able to find tofu cream cheese here in Asia! Any chance I can substitute it with regular tofu and if so, what tofu do I use?
Hi Melanie, I’m not sure it will bake up the same using regular tofu. If you were to use any tofu for baking, I would go with silken tofu.
We have two other recipes that use silken tofu, our dairy-free lemon cake (https://thewoksoflife.com/dairy-free-lemon-cake/) and our chocolate peanut butter tart (https://thewoksoflife.com/vegan-chocolate-peanut-butter-silk-tart/). You’d probably have more success starting with those than with this cheesecake!
Though if you do attempt a silken tofu cheesecake, please let us know how it turns out :)
Wow. I’ve made oat-milk and figured it worked great with my morning cereal.
I am now inspired by your creation here to explore other things, including vegetarian eggnog, veggie alfredo sauce, ah the sky’s the limit to explore. Whether we succeed or not doesn’t prohibit us from trying, right?
Thanks. You folks continue to inspire.
Thanks, Gregory! Definitely worth trying, I’ll be doing the same explorations in vegan cooking along with you :)
I have tried several no-bake dairy free cheesecakes and they all seem to stay soupy. I tried one baked cheesecake years ago whe I first went off dairy and it was gross. Will have to give this one a try :)
I am allergic to dairy as well as ALL citrus. If I leave out the lemon zest, any idea if I should add some sumac or white vinegar?
Thanks!!
Hope you enjoy, Stacy! That’s a bummer re: citrus. I would simply eliminate the lemon zest and have it be a vanilla cheesecake, though feel free to experiment with lemon substitutes you’ve used in the past. It’s just a flavor agent in this case, so it shouldn’t hold you back. Good luck!
Looks delicious! Do you know if you can tolerate A2 milk?
Hi Katwyn, thank you! I stay away from those milks, as it seems like they’re more processed, and I may still have sensitivity, but thank you for the tip! :)
Thank you for creating a cashew free, dairy free cheesecake! Really excited to try this! Looks excellent!
Thank you so much! Hope you enjoy :)