Seitan is mine

Friends!  I did it, I made seitan, and it was delicious!  You may remember the Thanksgiving wheat meat disaster, in which I produced an inedible, squeaky, bland loaf.  I was dispirited, but I persevered, thanks especially to my good friend and seitan cheerleader, Abby.  She had sent me a recipe a while back, and she is such an advocate for thoughtful, impromptu cooking, that I just gave it a go with what I had.  The resulting seitan, was very tasty, with mushroom stock flavor and an aromatic whiff of clove.  I was apprehensive about the texture, but it was perfect, soft but with a good heft and density.  Even Paddy liked it!

After making it, I sauteed it to crisp it up, and put it into homemade veggie pho.

You can see it poking out from under the cilantro and mint.  So good!  The following day, I sauteed some sliced seitan with leftover brussels sprouts and rice.  Delicious!  I used it the day after that on pizza.  I sliced the seitan into strips and sauteed them with fennel seeds and a pinch of smoked paprika to make 'pepperoni'.  Yum.

Have fun experimenting with different flavors and uses for the seitan.  I know I will!

Seitan

Adapted from Abby Glogower's Recipe

Makes 2 generous servings (or enough for 1 person for 3 meals)

Takes 1 hour

1 mushroom bullion cube (I used Harvest Sun--if you have any stock, use that)

2 cups of water

1 onion, chopped

1 clove garlic, minced

dash of ground cloves

dash of pepper

1/2 cup Vital Wheat Gluten

a pinch of paprika and a pinch of pepper

1/8 cup soy sauce

1/4 cup water

In a shallow, wide pot (large saute pan works), bring the bullion, water, onion, garlic, pepper and clove to a simmer.

Meanwhile, in a large bowl, combine vital wheat gluten with the spices.  Add in the soy sauce and water, and combine with your hands until a dough forms.  It will be very wet, and a bit elastic, and will glom together.  Pull off eight evenly sized bits (you can divide dough in half, and each half into half, etc, to make sure the pieces are evenly sized), and flatten into patties.  Add to the simmering broth, spreading them out in the pan to give them room to grow, and simmer for 45 minutes, or until most of the liquid is absorbed.  Turn the pieces over every 5–10 minutes to make sure both sides cook evenly.

Let me know what you use it for!