Crispy baked cauliflower florets smothered in a spicy buffalo sauce makes the BEST snack or appetizer! This vegan buffalo cauliflower wings recipe is the food you never knew you needed in your life.
If you are a fan of chicken wings, this recipe is for you. A vegan and healthy version of the comfort food – made with cauliflower of course!
This versatile veggie makes the best replacement for chicken. Pair with some celery, carrots, and vegan ranch for the ultimate treat.
Why I love this recipe:
- Baked instead of fried
- Easy to make gluten-free
- Crowd-pleasing recipe
- Spicy (which I love!)
- All plant-based
- Healthy
Ingredients for buffalo cauliflower wings
- Cauliflower
- All-purpose flour
- Paprika
- Garlic powder
- Salt
- Pepper
- Hot sauce (I use Frank’s)
- Vegan butter (I use Earth Balance)
- Lemon juice
How to cut cauliflower
- Start by removing the green leaves from the bottom (fig. 1)
- Using a sharp knife, trim the bottom stump (fig. 2)
- Cut the cauliflower head into quarters. From each quarter, cut the center stem diagonally (fig. 3)
- Break the cauliflower into bite-sized florets (fig. 4)
How to make cauliflower buffalo wings:
Combine the flour, seasonings, and almond milk. The mixture should be thick like a cake batter.
Using tongs, toss the cauliflower florets in the mixture, ensuring every piece is coated.
Place cauliflower on a cooling rack over a baking sheet that is lined with parchment paper. This helps to catch any of the excess batter.
Remove the parchment paper and grease the baking sheet. Transfer the cauliflower from the cooling rack to the baking sheet.
While the cauliflower is baking, combine the hot sauce, lemon juice and vegan butter. Once the cauliflower is done baking, brush each floret with buffalo sauce. Save the remaining buffalo sauce.
Bake for 10 more minutes once every floret is covered with sauce.
Toss the cauliflower in the remaining sauce to get extra saucy cauliflower bites!
How to make cauliflower bites gluten-free
I tested this recipe using rice flour and the results were fairly similar to using all-purpose flour. You might need to add more almond milk to the batter as rice flour sucks up a lot of liquid. As long as the batter is nice and thick, yet pourable, you are good!
If you tried this vegan buffalo cauliflower wing recipe, let me know in the comments below and share a photo using #mindfulavocado. I’d love to hear from you! Want to see more recipes? Let’s get social! CONNECT WITH ME on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or Pinterest to see what I’m currently cooking up!
If you like this recipe, you’ll LOVE:
Huli Huli Cauliflower Bites
Four Ingredient Avocado Fries
Baked Zucchini Fries (Vegan/GF/Keto)
Vegan Buffalo Cauliflower Wings
Ingredients
- 1 large head cauliflower
- 1 cup all-purpose flour can substitute with white rice flour to make GF
- 1 teaspoon paprika
- 2 teaspoons garlic powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon pepper
- 1.5 cup unsweetened almond milk
- 1/2 cup hot sauce I use Frank's
- 2 Tablespoons vegan butter melted; I use Earth Balance
- 1 Tablespoon lemon juice about 1/2 lemon
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 450 degrees Fahrenheit. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and top with a cooling rack. Set aside.
- Cut the cauliflower: Remove the green leaves from the bottom and trim the stump. Turn the cauliflower right-side-up and cut into quarters. From each quarter, trim the center by making a cut diagonally. Using hands, break cauliflower into florets.
- In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, paprika, garlic powder, salt, pepper, and almond milk. Whisk until smooth. The mixture should be thick and pourable like a cake batter.
- Add cauliflower florets to the mixing bowl and using tongs, coat evenly. Place cauliflower on the prepared baking sheet and allow the excess batter to drip from the cooling rack to the parchment paper.
- Discard the parchment paper and grease the baking sheet. Transfer the cauliflower from the cooling rack to the baking sheet. Bake for 20 minutes.
- In a small mixing bowl, combine hot sauce, vegan butter, and lemon juice. When cauliflower is done baking, remove from the oven and brush each piece with buffalo sauce.
- Bake cauliflower for an additional 10 minutes. Remove from the oven and coat with remaining buffalo sauce.
- Serve with vegan ranch, carrots, and celery.
Video
Notes
- Serve with vegan ranch, carrots, and celery. Leftovers keep for about 5 days. To reheat, bake at 200 for 15 minutes.
- To make gluten-free, substitute all-purpose four with rice flour.
Nutrition
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You have a beautiful blog Amanda. Just watched your presentation in the Food Blogger Summit. Thank you for all the great tips.
Thank you so much, Madhavi!
Sounds great!!! Can you use almond flour?
I’ve never tested it with almond flour. For a GF substitute, I would probably recommend brown rice flour!
Mine came out delicious but not crispy. Wonder why that is? I think I’ll bake them longer, or broil at the end
Sorry they did not turn out crispy! Broiling them for a few minutes will definitely help! I recommend doing that before applying the sauce.
In order to make this grain free I used cassava flour (not the same as tapioca flour) and airfried it. The coating crisped up very nicely!
Love the substitutions for making this recipe grain-free!
Haven’t made it yet because of the too high sodium. Any choices to lower sodium content?
Hi! If sodium is a concern for you, you can try finding an alternative hot sauce or vegan butter as those are the only ingredients in this recipe with added sodium. You can of course omit the added sodium in the recipe as well. I hope that helps!
I am not vegan I am a total meat eater but my daughter is vegan and has been for many many years… She came home for Christmas so on Christmas Eve we’ve always done finger foods appetizers kind of things and I was trying to find some things that I knew she would like and I came across this recipe when I thought it was simple enough to do I had no idea that she was going to go crazy the way she did over this stuff and I tried it and I even liked it so even since Christmas Yves I’ve made this twice and one of the things that I like about it is that the texture seems to change once it’s been refrigerated it is almost like a medium chicken texture or most if you will… I had warmed some up and I just got a thought in my head how great this would be unstopped corn tortillas with some Red onion and shredded cabbage and a little sauce that I make with mayo and milk or as I use almond milk… And it was amazing so this is going to be a regular item for me until I get sick of it LOL… Thanks so much for this
So happy to hear that, Lynn! Eating them in a taco sounds amazing! Thanks for taking the time to review my recipe 🙂