Product Review: Vegan Cream Cheese
Finally, I’m here to “cheese” the day! Family favorites await (especially black bottom caps). And for those, I need a spread that bakes as well as it tastes –
or tastes as good as it bakes?
The Contestants
I am both grateful for and overwhelmed by the number of plant-based products in stores. Even limiting myself to US-nationally available vegan cream cheeses, I found myself working with 7 different ones!
- Kite Hill Cream Cheese Alternative
- Miyoko’s Creamery Plant Milk Cream Cheese
- Oatly! Cream Cheese Non-Dairy Alternative
- Philadelphia Non-Dairy Plant-Based Original “Cream Cheese” Spread
- Trader Joe’s Vegan Cream Cheese Alternative
- Violife Just Like Cream Cheese Block
- Violife Just Like Cream Cheese Original
Each item can be found at such widespread chains including Walmart, Target, Aldi, Trader Joe’s, and Whole Foods Market. Regional and local companies may carry them as well.
Kindly note…
I make no commission from the products and links herein. Please consider the effort behind this content, and espresso your support on Ko-fi if you can ❤️
Part I: Taste Test
I recognize taste is subjective. Hence, similar to my “mayonnaise” and semi-sweet chocolate chip reviews, I decided to set each plant-based option herein against a conventional gold standard: Philadelphia Original Cream Cheese.
This luxurious alabaster prism of lactose is quantifiably the most popular schmear in the United States. As such, it is likely what a given US-American diner expects when served anything with cream cheese. I thus aimed my taste test at answering, “Which vegan alternative is most like Philly’s?” not, “Which vegan alternative do I like best?” It’s objectively objective!
Spreading the Love
Thank you to my beloved spouse Chuck and dear friend Liz from Georgia. This taste test is valid thanks to the invaluable input from these real cream cheese lovers!
We tested each vegan cream cheese alone, and then with pepper jelly on a butter cracker for fun. I credit Liz for bringing such a delectable combination to this Yankee’s attention.
7. Miyoko’s Creamery
“WHY DOES IT TASTE LIKE A SOUR PATCH KID?” Liz exclaimed with her first taste of Miyoko’s Creamery Plant Milk Cream Cheese.
And she’s not wrong. In fact, she was accurate before tasting when she noted this product spreads like pore filler.
Based on cashews, Miyoko’s “cream cheese” is a sour nut pâté with a coconut aftertaste. Even pepper jelly was no match for its astringency; rather, it made the inappropriate coconut flavor worse.
Nothing could hide that soft grit of soaked and blended tree nuts anyway. Even if the flavor were perfect, the texture of this schmear is all wrong.
6. Kite Hill
“Is it the mushroom extract?” I wondered as I tried to place what I was tasting in Kite Hill Cream Cheese Alternative. Something about it reminded me of bleu cheese!
Based on almonds, this spread is another nut pâté like Miyoko’s. And like Miyoko’s, the texture of this Kite Hill product is all wrong.
Its flavor isn’t much better (unless you like moldy almonds). I ranked it above Miyoko’s only because it was vaguely reminiscent of some kind of dairy concoction instead of a tropical drupe.
5. Trader Joe’s
Oddly, whether cold or room temperature, Trader Joe’s Vegan Cream Cheese Alternative is difficult to spread. The texture is smooth at least!
Yet it gives fake cheese too well. When thinking of similar tastes and flavors, Liz and I listed things like Velveeta and Handi-Snacks. “If individually-wrapped cheese products were a spread,” I commented at one point.
We agreed it would be OK on a plain bagel. A savory bagel would be too salty with this degree of Cheese Whiz-ness, and a sweet bagel would be too mismatched.
Chicken in a Biskit, anyone? I’m out.
4. Oatly!
What Trader Joe’s offers in saltiness, Oatly! Cream Cheese Non-Dairy Alternative offers in sweetness. “It tastes like a cheesecake,” Chuck noted.
but a very mild cheesecake. With only 1 gram of added sugar, this spread is decidedly dessert-like thanks to the inherent sweetness of oats.
My tasters and I enjoyed its smooth texture, and speculated it would balance an everything or other savory bagel nicely. When paired with the sweet heat of pepper jelly, however, we tasted too much sweet.
3. Violife (tub)
“It pretends nicely,” Chuck remarked on the texture of Violife Just Like Cream Cheese Original. Indeed, the silky mouthfeel of this spread is surprisingly close to dairy cream cheese.
He, Liz and I agreed, however, this is just like butter (so to speak) – not cream cheese. It’s also about as flavorless as it is colorless; when paired with pepper jelly, this pure-white non-dairy alternative practically disappeared.
2. Philadelphia
Most difficult to spread (and expensive to buy at the time of this writing), Philadelphia Non-Dairy Plant-Based Original “Cream Cheese” Spread is nonetheless our second favorite vegan schmear.
Though it’s more like cultured butter, we felt fairly close to a winner with this one. We’re looking to match a cultured dairy product after all!
It leans a little more toward the savory realm, but not so much that it wouldn’t go well on a sweet bagel.
1. Violife (block)
Violife Just Like Cream Cheese Block may be as “just like cream cheese” as a plant-based alternative can be. Liz and I were reminded of buttered sourdough bread, and while that’s not real cream cheese flavor, it rounds all the proverbial bases:
- dairy (buttered)
- cultured (sourdough)
- neutral (bread)
It also has a goldilocks mouthfeel: not gritty, not excessively silky – just right.
well…mostly right. It is silkier than our gold standard because it’s based on refined coconut oil (which doesn’t taste like coconut). By comparison, Chuck observed, “It dissolves.”
Yet to put a spin on a classic joke: What do you get when someone just barely knocks the ball out of the park?
a home run.
Part II: Bake Test
The simpler the recipe, the more clearly I can see how a vegan product behaves. And what could be simpler than a sweetened cream cheese Danish filling with 1/2 cup (120 mL/113 g) “cream cheese”; 3 Tbsp (45 mL/36 g) sugar, ground; and an “egg“?
Several elements were controlled including:
- Brand of Every Non-“Cream Cheese” Ingredient – I’m not brand-loyal by default, but when I create content, I source US-nationally available products. The following were used for this comparison project:
- Pan and Method of Preparing It – Two Calphalon rimmed nonstick baking sheets each lined with a Miu France silicone mat went to work!
- Mixing Bowls and Utensils – Since I am able to stir by hand, I grabbed a 3-qt/L stainless steel mixing bowl and silicone spatula. Every custard cup, moreover, baked inside one of 4 unnamed but identical white ceramic ramekins.
- Method of Measuring – Every ingredient was weighed to the gram.
- Appliances – As a business of one, I have only one hand mixer and oven!
- Cook and Rest Times – All cups baked for 20 minutes (at 350°F/180°C), then cooled completely on the baking sheet.
- Temperature Upon Tasting – I waited until all custards were at room temperature before taking bites and notes.
I even baked them all in the same day!
Cream of the Flop
In case you needed proof I’m not affiliated with any company herein, here it is:
All vegan cream cheeses failed the bake test.
Most turned a shade of grey after baking. And lest you think choosing the best-looking custard or averting your eyes could help, it doesn’t. Indeed, whatever tricks a company employed to mimic the mouthfeel of dairy cream cheese surrendered to heat revealing, in many cases, undeniably starch-thickened blobs.
I can offer you the best and worst “cream cheese” in a range of categories, but not a recommendation:
Performance
Worst: Violife Just Like Cream Cheese Original
Neither Violife product even pretended to hold its shape during baking. But the original tub variety leaked so much oil that the label I placed in front of it became translucent.
Best: Miyoko’s Creamery Plant Milk Cream Cheese
Perhaps the abundance of citric acid is why this “cream cheese” rose and fell exactly like the cultured (acidified) dairy control. They both released beautifully from their ramekins too!
Miyoko’s just also turned millennial greige. I’m sure someone my age wants this color in their kitchen, but it’s not me.
Color
Worst: Philadelphia Non-Dairy Plant-Based Original “Cream Cheese” Spread
Did no one think vegans would bake with this?
I’m not sure know which ingredients are responsible for turning Philly’s plant-based schmear brownish grey, but I am sure that I will not be making black bottom caps with it –
or anything for that matter.
Best: Violife Just Like Cream Cheese Block
With regard to baking, the Violife block has one thing going for it: color. It was second-to-last in performance and texture, but at least it didn’t look as gross as it baked and felt.
(The Violife tub was last.)
Texture
Worst: Violife Just Like Cream Cheese Original
Coincidentally, that which performed the worst also had the worst texture. This is not Danish pastry filling; it’s cheap slime.
Best: Miyoko’s Creamery Plant Milk Cream Cheese
OK, this shocked me. But think about it! When conventional cream cheese is baked with beaten chicken eggs, it develops micro-curds. Have you ever had scrambled eggs that were whisked instead of folded during cooking?
Or better yet, consider breaking off a forkful of cheesecake. That break isn’t smooth! Consequently, the soft grittiness I loathed in Miyoko’s as a spread was exactly what I wanted in any “cream cheese” as a baking ingredient.
Kite Hill, the other gritty alternative, ranked second here.
Taste/Flavor
Worst: Miyoko’s Creamery Plant Milk Cream Cheese
Oh, look, it’s Miyoko’s again! Despite baking and feeling like real cream cheese, sugar did nothing to hide that moldy coconut Sour Patch Kid flavor. If anything, heat highlighted it.
Best: Trader Joe’s Vegan Cream Cheese Alternative
I didn’t hate this, and that confused me. Then I remembered: Velveeta has an historically good fudge recipe. So of course this works!
Oatly! was OK too. flavor-wise! Texturally, I could feel the superfine starch of pureed oats coating my tongue with each bite.
Parting Notes
So you want to bake something with cream cheese. me too! But where do we vegans go from here?
My suggestion is to follow Miyoko’s “cream cheese” recipe. You can find it in her 2012 book Artisan Vegan Cheese, or reposted on several websites including Your Vegan Mom.
I hate that advice. My aim with this blog is to make plant-based culinary adventures as much like conventional ones as I can – and few people make their own cream cheese!
Yet I feel it’s what we must do. Following Miyoko’s “cream cheese” recipe, I hope, will yield a spread that bakes and even tastes like real cream cheese. (You may recall her prepackaged alternative performed exactly like the dairy-laden gold standard; it just tasted like crap.)
While I have yet to test this theory, my faith lies in her instruction to culture the “cream cheese” base 24-48 hours giving cooks control over how sour their final schmear tastes. Maybe a 24-hour culture will yield something more pleasant to eat than the product Miyoko sells?
At least one thing is certain: Put the Violife block on your bagel.
Did I miss one?
Leave a comment if you see a plant-based cream cheese at Walmart, Target, Aldi, Trader Joe’s, and/or Whole Foods Market that’s not on this list. I’d love to test it against my winner and update my content!
Please know I support and shop local when I can. Everywhere I’ve lived – and the number of places is many and growing – I have discovered numerous small companies making fantastic vegan alternatives.
Yet as much as I commend them, they are not the focus of this blog. My goal instead is to curate and present information that travels with me to wherever I go, and then travels again from wherever I am to wherever you are ❤️
