Gluten-Free Vegan Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecake
This Gluten-Free Vegan Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecake tastes like your favorite candy turned into a delightfully creamy vegan cheesecake. With a chocolate crust, creamy peanut butter filling, and chocolate ganache topping, you won’t be able to have just one bite!
So, I’ve had my website for just about 9 years (!!!) and somehow, I’m just finally getting a recipe up for a Gluten-Free + Vegan Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecake. When I took my first bite of this cheesecake, my first thought was “what in the world has taken me so long to make this???‘
If you’ve been around the block here with me for a minute, you’ll know that I love my chocolate + peanut butter recipes. Peanut Butter Chocolate Chunk Blondies, Chocolate Peanut Butter Overnight Oats, Chocolate Peanut Butter Fudge…and that’s just to name a few.
So naturally, a peanut butter cup cheesecake is next in line. I have no doubt that this easy recipe will be a new favorite.
Let’s make a Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecake!
To start – let’s chat about the crust. We make it with roasted peanuts, almond flour, cacao powder, maple syrup, coconut oil, and a pinch of salt. You’ll pulse the ingredients together until a sticky dough is formed and press into the pan. It’s rich and chocolatey and SO good!
Next up, the most important part: the luscious peanut butter filling. As with most of my vegan cheesecakes, this one has a base of raw cashews. You’ll soak the cashews in water to soften, and then blend them up with peanut butter, coconut milk, maple syrup, coconut oil, lemon juice (adds that cheesecakey tang!) and vanilla extract. Voila! Pour over the crust, put it in the fridge, and we’re so close to it being finished.
Once the Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecake is nice and chilled, we cover it in luscious chocolate ganache. 😋 It’s so simple – just chocolate and coconut milk. Once it’s poured all over the cheesecake, garnish as desired!
Here are some garnishing options:
- Mini peanut butter cups (like I used)
- Homemade peanut butter cups
- Roasted peanuts
- Chocolate chips
- Peanut butter drizzle
With one bite, you’ll be transported to peanut butter cup heaven! This Gluten-Free Vegan Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecake is creamy, bursting with chocolate and peanut butter flavor, and is my personal definition of the PURE BLISS. I hope you love it as much as I do!
If you love this recipe…you’ll also love these:
- Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Chocolate Peanut Butter Overnight Oats
- Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Bites
Gluten-Free Vegan Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecake
- Prep Time: 20 minutes
- Total Time: 260 minutes
- Yield: 10 slices 1x
- Category: Dessert
- Cuisine: cheesecake
Description
This Gluten-Free Vegan Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecake tastes like your favorite candy turned into a delightfully creamy vegan cheesecake. With a chocolate crust, creamy peanut butter filling, and chocolate ganache topping, you won’t be able to have just one bite!
Ingredients
For the crust
- ½ cup roasted peanuts
- 1 cup (96g) almond flour
- 3 tablespoons cacao powder
- 3 tablespoons (63g) pure maple syrup
- 2 tablespoons (25g) refined coconut oil
- ½ teaspoon sea salt
For the cheesecake
- 1½ cups raw cashews (soaked for at least four hours or preferably overnight, drained and rinsed in cool water before using)
- ½ cup canned full-fat coconut milk
- ⅓ cup (111g) pure maple syrup
- ½ cup (128g) creamy peanut butter
- 2 tablespoons refined coconut oil, melted and cooled
- 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ½ teaspoon sea salt, salt to taste if your peanut butter is salted
For the dark chocolate drizzle & garnish
- 3 ounces dark chocolate, finely chopped
- ¼ cup canned full-fat coconut cream (just the thick, creamy part from the top of the can)
- Mini peanut butter cups
Instructions
- Grease a 6” springform pan with coconut oil, or line a 6” cake pan or an 8×8” square baking pan with parchment paper for easy removal and grease well with coconut oil. Set aside.
- Add the peanuts, almond flour, cacao powder, and salt to a food processor or high-powered blender and pulverize to break up the peanuts until just small bits remain. Add the maple syrup and coconut oil and pulse until it comes together into a dough, with small peanut bits remaining. Press the dough evenly along the bottom of the prepared pan.
- In a high-powered blender (I used my Vitamix, but most powerful blenders should do the job), combine all of the filling ingredients and blend for about 2 to 4 minutes, or until the mixture is silky smooth and super creamy. Use your tamper and scrape down the sides as necessary to get it to blend smoothly.
- Pour the smooth filling into the prepared pan over the chocolate crust. Smooth out the top and tap the pan hard against the counter a few times to release any air bubbles. Place in the freezer to set for at least 3 hours, or in the refrigerator to set for at least 6 hours.
- For the chocolate ganache, place your chopped chocolate in a small bowl. Heat the coconut cream in a saucepan or microwave until steaming and just barely simmering and pour over the chocolate. Let stand for 3 minutes and then whisk until smooth. Spread over the top of the cheesecake, letting it drip down the sides as desired.
- Store in the refrigerator or freezer. I recommend running your knife under hot water to warm it up before cutting the cheesecake with the still-hot (dried) knife.
- If serving from frozen, let thaw at room temperature for 10-15 minutes before serving. Store in an airtight container in the freezer for up to 2 months or in the fridge for up to 5 days.
Notes
For a Paleo-friendly version: swap out the peanuts & peanut butter with almonds/almond butter or cashews/cashew butter (or any other nut/seed you prefer).
Keywords: cheesecake, peanut butter, chocolate, dessert, cake, vegan, gluten free
I am allergic to nuts (tree nuts not legumes). What could I substitute for nuts in the cheesecake, would peanuts work?
Hi Gayle, I’m guessing you mean in place of the almond flour and cashews, right? For the almond flour in the crust, you could grind up peanuts into a flour to use in place of the almond flour. For the cashews, I would try replacing them with peanut butter. I’d use 1 1/2 cups peanut butter total, and increase the coconut oil amount to 1/3 cup to keep it firm. I hope this helps! Let me know how it turns out :)
Hi! This sounds delicious! I am a little confused with the coconut milk for the filling and ganache. The ingredient list states coconut milk but the ganache instructions state coconut cream. Are you using a “shaken” can of coconut milk for both? Or are you scraping off just the cream on top of the can for both the filling and ganache? Thank you!
Hi Jessica! For the filling, you use the shaken can of coconut milk (cream and water mixed together). For the ganache, just the cream on top works better. Hope this helps.
Made this for my own birthday party, and everyone LOVED IT! I didn’t have a 6” pan, so I used an 8” springform. Still amazing, but I’m going to have to make this again with the thicker layers for sure!! ❤️
★★★★★
Hi Melissa, yes this would’ve been best doubled in an 8″ springform pan but I’m SO thrilled it was a hit! Happy birthday :D
I’ve made this recipe twice now and it is easy and delicious! It also looks like professional magazine picture when you’re done. The layers hold together beautifully. I’m gluten, dairy, and egg free and I never thought I’d be able to have cheesecake again. The consistency and flavor is delicious. My husband who doesn’t have any dietary restrictions loves this recipe! I’ve learned a few things making it. First, all the filling ingredients fit into my food processor. So, for one recipe I left everything in the food processor instead of moving it to the blender. I’m not sure if this has a negative impact or not (?) or if the blender does something differently like add extra air to the filling. I didn’t have a strong enough blender to get everything to mix together, so the food processor seemed to work just fine. Second, the ganache is super easy to make. I made an unknown mistake my first time where the pan I used was just a little wet with water (I had just washed it and didn’t dry it completely. I learned that day that melted chocolate does NOT play well with even the slightest drop of water. It turns grainy and separates. So, my second recipe, the ganache came out perfectly. I would highly recommend this cheesecake!!
★★★★★
One more thing – I used a 7” spring form round pan and the layers were very thick. It worked out well!
Thank you so much for sharing your feedback, Adrienne! I’m so glad you’re loving the recipe, and using the food processor is just fine if your blender is high-powered enough. I don’t have a large food processor, which is why I always use my blender :) I hope you continue to enjoy the recipe!!
Hi! I cant finde coconut milk can . How can i replace ir?
Hi Ag, have you looked in the Asian section of your grocery store? That’s usually where it is. If you need to replace it, you can use a non-dairy milk but the cheesecake will likely be a softer, looser texture. Enjoy!
Hello! I am wondering if I could bake this crust? I am using a mixture of dates and water instead of maple syrup, fyi, but im wondering what benefit baking the crust has, and although there is no need to bake it, would it turn out just a delicious if I tried to harden it up a bit. Just curious for your thoughts! (I am making a hybrid “cheesecake” from a couple different recipes!)
Hi Stephanie, I’ve never baked a date crust before so not sure what would happen there!! I don’t think there would be any specific benefit to baking it- keeping it raw will keep more nutrients intact! I hope this helps.
The flavor of this cheesecake is really delicious! I only have a 8” so that is what I used so it was fairly thin (makes sense) and was expecting to be thin and that was fine. However, my cheesecake never set properly which I found odd. I left it in the fridge for 8 hours before serving and it was like pudding consistency. I’m trying to leave it in the freezer overnight to see if that helps. I followed the recipe exactly so I’m not sure what went wrong! But the flavor is wonderful and if the freezer doesn’t work to set it, I’ll have to try it again soon! I’m determined!
★★★★
Hi Danielle! So sorry it never set up – so odd! One thought, did you use liquid coconut oil by any chance – the kind that never solidifies? Because this recipe needs the coconut oil to firm up. Another thought is if your peanut butter was super duper liquidy/oily, it may have thrown off the ratio. Feel free to DM on Instagram or send me an email if you want help solving what went wrong!!
I used solid coconut oil! I ended up keeping it in the freezer for a day and that seemed to work! When I wanted a piece I just took it from the freezer and let it thaw a couple minutes before enjoying!! the flavor was absolutely wonderful and I can’t wait to try it again!
★★★★★
This recipe is amazing!! Do you know the nutritional facts per serving?
★★★★
Made in a non-spring pan and it came out easily. I think next time, instead of almond flour, I would use crushed gluten free graham crackers. Delicious pie though!
★★★★★
This turned out amazing! 5 y/o recently gone dairy free approved Thank you!
★★★★★
So glad it was a hit! Thanks for the feedback, Cass :)
This looks amazing and I will be making this for my mom who recently went DF (we are GF so this recipe is a huge win for us). Question: I have never worked with cacao powder before. How would the crust be affected if cocoa powder is used instead? I have a nice Dutch DF/GF cocoa powder on hand but no cacao powder. Thanks for any info you can share.
Hi Kirsten, no problem with using cocoa powder instead! They are the same product, cacao is just raw, whereas cocoa is roasted. I hope it’s a hit!
Thank you! I will definitely let you know how it turns out. Thanks so much for the additional info.
I made this for my mom who can’t have dairy. Additionally, we have to eat GF so it checked all our boxes. Here are some of the things I learned as I had never made a dessert like this:
1) I was glad I made the crust and the cheesecake portions the night before so it could set overnight in the freezer. I made/poured the ganache the next day a few hours before serving.
2) My food processor was not strong enough to get the cashews creamy enough. I thought it would be. It really wasn’t. I had to transfer everything into my ninja blender. This wasn’t ideal and I prob need to get a vitamix.
3) after pouring the ganache, I placed in freezer for about 15 minutes then transferred to fridge a few hours before dinner. It cut great and held together just fine. I used a hot, dry knife as suggested.
4) I made my own peanut butter cups using a recipe which blends coconut oil with DF chocolate for the shell and then used almond flour and powdered sugar to thicken my peanut butter. It was very easy and I used egg cartons to hold my mini-muffin wrappers as I did not have a mini-muffin pan. Worked great! –
I will be making this again.
It really is a showstopper.
If you want to see my version for proof that this is a truly doable recipe (I followed the recipe to the letter btw) it can be found on my Instagram @swedishgirlbakery .
★★★★★
Thanks for the feedback, Kirsten! A good blender is definitely key here for getting the cashews to a nice smooth consistency. So glad you enjoyed it!!
This cake is the stuff my dreams are made of… I absolutely cannot wait to try this!
I hope you love it Lea!
This cheesecake recipe is AMAZING! I’ve pretty much decided to exclusively make recipes from this blog because the two I’ve tried (and made multiple times) are incredible. I know people always say this, but the non-vegans loved it and couldn’t believe it was vegan. Beautiful texture, perfectly sweetened and flavors were on point. Thanks for making awesome, easy recipes :)
★★★★★
Woohoo!! This makes me SO HAPPY to hear – what a compliment!! Thank you so much, Hannah :) it is truly my pleasure.
I’ve made this recipe twice and it was delicious both times. I am not a seasoned baker/cook and would love to adapt this recipe for a fresh, fruit cheesecake. Instead of using the peanuts for the crust, I think I could use graham crackers. For the filling, what would you double up on to offset the lack of peanut butter? More cashews?
Hi Erin, I actually have a number of similar recipes with fruity twists – you can see them all here!
I made this in a 6” spring form pan which I had lying around and have been dying to use. It came together easily. I used a food processor bc my blender isn’t the best tbh lol and I think it took longer for the filling (not the crust that was quick) but eventually it came together and was perfectly smooth and thick. I was so worried I was gonna have too much filling but it ended up filling it perfectly to the top of my pan. It’s chilling/setting in the fridge rn and I’m so excited to eat it tomorrow!
★★★★★
So glad you loved it, Abby! Thanks so much for the feedback :) enjoy!
Everyone who ate this cheesecake said the same thing. Can it be made in a bigger size?
So delicious, such a delicacy! One of the most incredible cakes ever! Thank you Rachel!
Hi Paula, so glad you loved it! You can definitely double this recipe and put it in an 8″ or 9″ pan :)