Dont Fear the Seitan

So I was all psyched up to make Julie Hasson's famous sausages this weekend when my friend said she'd gotten BBQ seitan at a restaurant. Follower that I am, I wanted BBQ seitan too, so I made the BBQ Seitan and Crispy Coleslaw Sandwich from Veganomicon. Isa and Terry say the sandwich is based on one they had at 'Snice and few things can recommend a recipe to me more strongly than a comparison to 'Snice, so I was sold. I made Simple Seitan, Backyard BBQ Sauce and Home-Style Potato Rolls (all from VCON), put it all together with some coleslaw (included in sandwich recipe) and a bit of Vegannaise and died and went to heaven.

I know a lot of people are wary of making seitan. After The Lambs' Brains Debacle of '08, I understand why (thanks to Trina for that visual). But this was my second time making the Simple Seitan, and it's wonderful yet again. Clearly, it wasn't beginner's luck. This is just a fool proof way to make seitan. And to prove seitan making isn't scary or difficult (just time consuming), I'm going to take you through it with pictures (I think I did this last time, too, but I definitely took more pictures this time). In case you're not interested in all that, here's what my mouth is going to see as soon as this is posted:



The beginning of making seitan isn't much different from baking. Mix your dry ingredients (in this case, vital wheat gluten and nutritional yeast):



Mix your wet ingredients (oil, garlic, soy sauce and some other stuff):



Combine your wet and dry. Mix it up, knead it for a while and cut it in thirds:



Throw it in a pot with some broth, bring it to a boil, simmer for a while, drain:



Tada! Your seitan is done and ready to be used in the recipe of your choice. It was my choice to slice it up:



And grill it in a grill pan brushed with peanut oil:



I think grill marks are sexy:



I tossed the grilled seitan in the Backyard BBQ Sauce and re-grilled:



Hot grill lines:



Don't forget to make your coleslaw:



Then, slice a roll in half, give it a little shmear of Vegannaise, a drizzle of BBQ sauce if you have bigger balls than me (the Backyard BBQ Sauce is too spicy for me plain, but it's perfect in the sandwich), pile on your coleslaw, top that with seitan, squish down the top bun and have the best lunch ever. It's one of the many recipes I've found in Veganomicon that leave me thinking "I can't believe this came out of my kitchen!"

Eat, Drink & Be Awesome

After hearing some good things about it, I recently picked up Dreena Burton's Eat, Drink & Be Vegan. I like it enough to be interested in getting her other two books, but not any time soon because I have TOO MANY DAMN COOKBOOKS already.

Anyway, I was in an Indian sort of mood, so I made the Zucchini Chickpea Tomato Curry and Cucumber Mint Raita. NOM!



For the curry, the cook time is short enough to keep the green beans crunchy, which is super awesome. And the seasoning is perfect. I think it may be a bit spicier than the Red Lentil Cauliflower Curry from Veganomicon, but it's still very good (if I had to choose between the two, I'd pick the VCON one, though. Sorry! Thankfully, I don't have to!). I ate this for lunch every day for a week, then made myself switch over to something else and freeze the leftovers (the portions are very generous as listed). I finally came back to my frozen curry yesterday and it was such a treat. I ate the last portion today and my belly is still doing a happy dance (metaphorically speaking).

The raita was really interesting. My brother came downstairs while I was grating the cucumber and asked what I was doing. When I told him, he said "That's the stupidest ingredient ever. Cucumber doesn't have any taste. You're doing all that work for nothing."

O RLY?

I had him smell the grated cucumber when it was done, and he couldn't believe what a strong fragrance it had (I don't know how he could miss it). Mixed in with the mint, it added a very fresh, cool flavor to the yogurt. I know raita is supposed to be served with roti, but I ate the curry over rice and didn't want another carb, so I just threw it on a basic salad (usually using much less than pictured below; I just wanted to make sure it photographed all right). It was splendid.

Salad Days

Among my other lovely Giftmas presents, I received Vegan Planet, a huge (and therefore immensely intimidating) cookbook. The first thing I tried from it was the Tomato and White Bean Salad with Watercress.



Wow. The dressing for this salad is really simple, really tasty and really (REALLY) strong. It's pretty much just pureed shallots and garlic with a bit of oil and lemon juice, but it's SO yummy.

A note of caution: the fragrance is powerful. I don't know if they actually could, but I felt like everyone could smell garlic on me for two days after making/eating it. So serve it with mints if you're having a romantic dinner. Just saying.