These Purple Sweet Potato Cheesecakes are vividly colourful, perfectly sweet and surprisingly healthy!
I absolutely love purple sweet potatoes, and have previously used them for lots of different desserts, including ice cream, mochi and milkshakes.
I adore their natural sweetness, almost perfume-like flavour, and of course their beautiful colour! They’re also really, really healthy.
These little Purple Sweet Potato Cheesecakes are pretty easy to make too, and unlike a lot of other vegan cheesecake recipes you see around, there’s no freezing required.
Another way in which they’re slightly different to more traditional vegan cheesecake recipes is that instead of just using cashew nuts as a base, I added the purple sweet potatoes, and didn’t use any coconut oil to make them set, instead relying on the starch from the sweet potatoes.
I personally think this makes the texture slightly softer and more conventional cheesecake-like and makes them taste better as well, because the overall flavour doesn’t become overpowered by the coconut oil.
Using a mixture of purple sweet potatoes and cashews instead of just cashews makes these slightly cheaper to make too, and a little less overbearingly nut-based.
These cheesecakes are pretty easy to make too – all you need is one food processor, a muffin tin and muffin cases!
You will need to cook your purple sweet potatoes first, but what I like to do is cook a big batch of them, mash, divide into smaller portions and freeze them.
Spare frozen purple sweet potato is useful for making things like ice cream, mochi and milkshakes!
Although these cheesecakes are vegan, gluten-free and refined sugar free, I promise you won’t be able to notice it at all. I absolutely love the combination of a salty-sweet, crunchy, base paired with the tender, melt-in-your-mouth topping.
These cheesecakes are so delicious topped with coconut whipped cream or coconut yogurt and fresh fruit such as raspberries or chopped mango!
If you like purple sweet potatoes as much as I do, be sure to check out my:
- Purple Sweet Potato Ice Cream
- Purple Sweet Potato Milkshake
- Purple Sweet Potato Smoothie Bowl
- Purple Sweet Potato Mochi
If you try out this recipe or anything else from my blog, I’d really love to hear any feedback! Please give it a rating, leave a comment, or tag a photo #rhiansrecipes on Instagram! Thank you.
Helpful tools to make these Purple Sweet Potato Cheesecakes:
food processor
muffin/cupcake tin
Purple Sweet Potato Cheesecakes (Vegan + GF)
Ingredients
For the crust:
- 65 g (1/2 cup) pecan nuts, walnuts or brazil nuts
- 90 g (1/2 cup) pitted dates
- Pinch of salt
For the cheesecake:
- 200 g (7oz) purple sweet potato, peeled and diced
- 150 g (1 cup) cashew nuts, soaked overnight in cold water or in boiling water for 10 minutes
- 4 tablespoons maple syrup to taste (or sub any other sweetener)
- Juice of 1/2 lemon
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 tablespoons coconut yogurt (or sub any other plant-based yogurt)
To serve:
- Coconut whipped cream (or sub coconut yogurt)
- Fresh fruit
Instructions
- Line a muffin tin with muffin cases
For the crust:
- Add all the ingredients listed to a food processor and blitz until you get a crust that easily sticks together but that still has some texture
- Divide the crust mixture between the muffin cases, pressing down with your fingers, the back of a spoon or the bottom of a small cup or glass to make it as compact as possible
- Place these in the fridge while you make the rest
For the cheesecake:
- Boil or steam the purple sweet potato until soft enough to pierce with a fork (should take about 15 minutes)
- Drain the soaked cashews
- In the same food processor (no need to wash it out), add all the ingredients for the cheesecake and whizz until completely smooth
- Taste and adjust amount of sweetener if necessary
- Divide the cheesecake mixture between the cases and place back in fridge until completely set (will take up to a few hours)
- Keeps covered in the fridge for up to a few days
To serve:
- They're delicious topped with coconut whipped cream or coconut yogurt and fresh fruit such as raspberries or chopped mango!
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Marie
Hi Rhian, could these be frozen? Thanks 🙂
Rhian Williams
Yes definitely! Just thaw at room temperature for about 30 mins before eating – let me know if you have any other questions!
Anonymous
Love this idea!!
Rhian Williams
Thank you!
Nicole
Made these last night following the recipe exactly. They are AMAZING! I haven’t eaten cheesecake in years because of how rich it is, the dairy in it always killed my stomach. Tastes so much like normal cheesecake that I was nervous eating it at first, thinking I’d end up with a massive stomach ache afterwards! 😂
Rhian Williams
Thank you so much, so glad you liked them! I’m so happy to hear you were able to eat cheesecake without problems!