This quick and easy recipe for sunflower seed cheesy spaghetti uses courgette (zucchini) to make courgetti or zucchini noodles. The creamy seed-based sauce makes a filling low-carb and dairy-free meal. Suitable for raw vegan, gluten-free, nut-free and paleo diets.

I’ve made a similar recipe to this with my creamy tomato courgette pasta but in that recipe cashew nuts were used and the courgetti is cooked. Here instead of cooking it’s massaged with salt to give a soft cooked like texture to the courgetti without cooking out any of the goodness.

Nut-free as many people are on nut free diets and seeds are significantly cheaper.

Sunflower Cheese Raw Courgetti Video

As this dish contains sunflower seeds, sesame seeds and nutritional yeast it’s high in protein, calcium and B vitamins. The perfect healthy dairy-free alternative to cheesy pasta.

If you are following a vegan diet then look out for nutritional yeast that is fortified with B12 as this can be difficult have sufficient amounts without supplementation.

Nutritional yeast has an unfortunate name and look, but really does help give a cheesy nutty taste to dishes.

Sunflower seeds work really well for this recipe as they have an earthy taste that works really well with the raw fruit. I could use cashews in every single recipe but I try to limit them to eat a variety of foods and have a healthy bank balance.

If you are used to normal starchy carbs from wheat pasta then you might not feel full after eating a portion of this. I often feel like this with raw dishes so I try to eat slowly making sure every mouthful is chewed thoroughly.

You may not feel full immediately after finishing the dish. However give it 20 minutes and you may feel satisfied without that unpleasant overeating feeling that is easy to get from normal pasta.

The basil and tomatoes that the dish is topped with are totally optional – they work well but use what you have about. This dish also works really well with olives, sweet peppers and avocado.

This recipe calls for the sunflower seeds to be soaked in order to start them sprouting. This is sometimes called activating and makes the nutrients more bioavailable. I always try to soak my seeds and even if I’m in a hurry a 15-minute soak is still better than not soaking at all.

A spiralizer is the best way to quickly make oodles of veggie noodles. They are wildly available in kitchen and health food shops in the UK. If you don’t have one then try using a vegetable julienne slicer or a veggie peeler to make thin ribbons. These zucchini noodles are keto friendly.

When you massage the zucchini noodles they do let out a fair bit of water. I left all of this in as to not extract any goodness and it helps to coat all of the courgetti in the creamy sunflower seed sauce.