Low-Calorie Vegan Almond Panna Cotta

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Panna cotta is a dessert from northern Italy made with cream, gelatin, sugar, and vanilla. But I decided we deserve a delicious vegan almond panna cotta without saturated fat or cholesterol.

It's easy to make, tastes delicious, and comes in at under 200 calories!

Just know that this isn't a super-sweet dessert. The sweetness is gentle, but it still feels plenty indulgent.

• A few things to know about vegan almond panna cotta
• The setting agent in this recipe is agar-agar, a flavorless, seaweed-derived vegan alternative to gelatin. On European food labels, it's listed as E406.
• You can find it at health food stores and specialty food shops. It's a great ingredient to have around for setting desserts like this one.
• I used 1 1/2 tablespoons of agar-agar flakes in this recipe. If you have powder, the conversion is 1 tablespoon of flakes = 1 teaspoon of powder.
• For that lovely almond flavor, I used natural almond butter with no added sugar. You can swap it for coconut cream, peanut butter, or even tahini.
• The almond butter adds a little fat and "body" to the dessert. Because come on, there's only so "light" a dessert can be. We're supposed to enjoy it, too.
• The base is unsweetened soy milk, but you can use any plant-based milk you like. Almond milk would be a good flavor match here.
• I sweetened the almond panna cotta with silan (date syrup). It really doesn't need any more sweetness. You can replace the silan with the same amount of maple syrup or another sweetener you prefer.

Vegan Almond Panna Cotta Nutrition

One serving of panna cotta (out of 4) contains:

• 160 calories
• 20 grams carbohydrate
• 1 gram protein
• 8 grams fat

Vegan Almond Panna Cotta

Yield 4 servings

Calories 160 kcal

Ingredients

• 2 cups soy milk 450 ml (about 1 7/8 US cups)
• 4 tablespoons silan 60 g (2.1 oz)
• 4 tablespoons almond butter with no added sugar 40 g (1.4 oz)
• 1 tablespoon agar-agar flakes
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Instructions

1. Add the soy milk, 3 tablespoons of silan, almond butter, vanilla extract, and agar-agar to a small saucepan.

2. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to low and cook for about 5 minutes.

3. The agar-agar needs to be brought to a boil and cooked to activate its setting power.

4. Warm the remaining silan in the microwave until it's fluid and easy to pour.

5. Pour a teaspoon of the warmed silan into a small cup.

6. Pour the soy milk and agar-agar mixture into the cup.

7. Refrigerate for at least 1 hour.

8. Before serving, gently loosen the panna cotta with a knife or teaspoon.

9. The edges should release easily.

10. Turn the cup upside down over a plate, then lift it off.

11. Serve cold.