More from Viva Vegan!

Greetings from Planet Houston!

(The astronaut cow statue at Houston's IAH airport)

I'm back in Houston after having to testify in a trial in New York City.  I had forgotten how much I loved New York's vegan food.  During the short time I was there, I ate at Candle Café and Blossom, two of my very favorite restaurants.  I love Houston, but I don't know if a day will ever come that I can go out for a nice fancy dinner and order seitan in a port wine-mushroom sauce.  A girl can always dream.

In the spirit of yummy vegan food, here are the results of my most recent projects from Viva Vegan!  As I mentioned in a previous post, I made the Red Chile Sauce (page 45) and wanted to use it in the Red Chile Enchiladas (page 135).  To do so, I also had to make the Steamed Red Seitan (page 34) and Pine Nut Crema (page 45).

The Steamed Red Seitan didn't look like I thought it would; it was more tan than red.  

I eventually realized that I had only used half of the amount of tomato paste that I was supposed to use.  Even though I had gone slightly off-recipe, it still turned out delicious.  It was shockingly moist.  I've heard people talk about meat that falls right off the bone (gross) or melts in your mouth.  I imagine this seitan was the vegetarian equivalent.  

The recipe yielded twice as much seitan as needed for the enchiladas, so the night before I made the enchiladas I used the seitan to make a quick meal for Boyfriend and I- sautéed seitan, onions, and black beans with yellow rice and avocado.  Boyfriend LOVED the seitan.  All of the recipes I've made from Viva Vegan! have scored major points with him.

I also made the Pine Nut Crema ahead and refrigerated it until I was ready to make the enchiladas.  I tried out the Pine Nut Crema after I made it and was skeptical.  I'm not vegan.  I'm vegetarian, so I know what cheesy sauces are supposed to taste like.  This sauce tasted like tofu mixed with pine nuts.  At that point, I had a feeling I was not going to be thrilled with the enchiladas.  I made them anyway, and was pleasantly mistaken. 

The enchiladas were filled primarily with waxy potatoes and Steamed Red Seitan.  They were bathed in the Red Chile Sauce and topped with the Pine Nut Crema.  In the interest of full disclosure, I used some low-carb onion and herb tortillas instead of the corn tortillas that were called for.  I also ended up only making half of the recipe, since the full recipe would feed six people and I was only cooking for myself: one fresh meal and two quick reheated lunches.

The Red Chile Enchiladas were what I imagine meat enchiladas are supposed to taste like.  If I had grown up on this kind of food, or even if I had ever eaten a meat-filled enchilada, I'm sure these enchiladas would make great comfort food.  I'm happy to report that the Pine Nut Crema, in combination with the Red Chile Sauce, really did taste like a creamy cheesy sauce.  That kind of taste is very hard to accomplish with a vegan recipe, but Master Terry managed, of course.  The only down side to this meal is that it does take a lot of effort.  Since I made most of the ingredients ahead of time, it came together rather quickly.  Still, I think the next time I make enchiladas I might opt for a semi-homemade version using pre-made enchilada sauce and Daiya "cheese" on top. 

This cookbook might be too good.  I decided to give myself a little distance from it because I've been neglecting so many of my other cookbooks that I want to try out.  My newest one, "Silk Road Cooking: A Vegetarian Journey", by Najmieh Batmanglij, has been begging me to experiment with it.  So, Latin America may have to wait for a bit while I head over to Persia.

Seitan with Spinach, Sun-Dried Tomatoes, and Kalamata Olives

I love when I can make a quick, flavorful meal with only a few ingredients. A lot of these ingredients are left over from the pastry-topped portabellos that I made a few nights ago. The kalamata olives and sun-dried tomatoes really stand out in this dish.

Seitan with Spinach, Sun-Dried Tomatoes, and Kalamata Olives
Makes 1 serving

• 1 tbsp Earth Balance margarine
• 4 ounces (1/2 package) seitan, broken into bite-sized pieces
• 1 cup packed baby spinach, rinsed and drained but not dried
• 5 sun-dried tomatoes, soaked in hot water until softened, then finely chopped
• 2 tbsp kalamata olive tapenade

Heat a nonstick pan over medium-high heat. Add all of the ingredients and cover. Stir occasionally, until the spinach is wilted.

Nutrition Facts: 339 calories, 20.5 g fat, 0 mg cholesterol, 974.3 mg sodium, 15.6 g carbohydrates, 24.5 g protein

Red Pepper Seitan

The picture above is what I took for lunch today for my internship: red pepper seitan, brown basmati rice, and sweet-and-sour toovar dal. The toovar dal is from Madhur Jaffrey's "World Vegetarian". I think I did something wrong (maybe I wasn't supposed to drain the pigeon peas, but there was just way too much liquid!) but they were still pretty good.

This Indian-inspired red pepper seitan dish was really easy to prepare and only uses 5 ingredients. It's high in protein and doesn't contain any oil other than that already in the seitan. On top of that, it's so yummy!

Red Pepper Seitan
Makes 4 small servings

• 1 red bell pepper, cored, seeded, and roughly chopped
• 1 serrano chili, stem end cut off and roughly chopped (don't remove the seeds)
• 1 pound seitan (I used West Soy traditional seitan because I didn't feel like making any)
• 1/4 cup plain soy yogurt (or regular plain yogurt if you don't care whether it's vegan)
• 1/4 cup chopped cilantro

Put the red pepper and serrano chili into a blender and blend into a smooth sauce. (If you taste it at this point, it will be REALLY spicy, but it will cool down!) Pour the sauce into a pan, add the seitan, and heat over medium-high heat until most of the liquid has evaporated. Stir in the yogurt and cilantro, and remove from heat. If you plan to serve this with rice, you might want to make extra sauce, especially if reheating it as a leftover.

Seitan Tikka Masala

"India's 500 Best Recipes" by Shehzad Husain, Rafi Fernandez, Mridula Baljekar, and Manisha Kanani is one of my favorite cookbooks. The cookbook has a section devoted to vegetarian main dishes, but my favorite way to use the cookbook is to vegetarianize the meat dishes. It's incredibly easy and usually just requires that I substitute seitan for chicken. I've had plenty of vegetarian Indian food in restaurants, but have never found a restaurant with vegetarianized versions of Indian meat dishes. Now I don't have to miss out on "chicken" tikka masala.

Seitan Tikka Masala

Makes 4 servings

• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 onion, diced
• 1 tbsp minced garlic
• 1 tbsp minced ginger
• 1 green chili, seeded and diced
• 1 tbsp tomato paste
• 6 tbsp tikka paste
• 1/2 cup plain low-fat yogurt
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• Three 8-ounce packages seitan
• fresh cilantro to garnish

Instructions

1. Cook the onion, garlic, ginger, and chili in the olive oil in a large pan for 5 minutes. Add the tomato paste, tikka paste, and water to the pan and simmer uncovered for 10 minutes.

2. Remove from heat and blend the mixture in a blender or food processor until it's smooth. Return the sauce to the pan and mix in the lemon juice, yogurt, and seitan.

3. Let the seitan simmer in the sauce for 10 minutes, then serve over rice or with naan. Add cilantro as garnish.

1,000 Vegan Recipes: Simple Simmered Seitan

I had some plain yogurt leftover from a couple of weeks ago and wanted to use it up, so I decided to vegetarianize the Chicken Korma recipe from "India's 500 Best Recipes" by Shehzad Husain, Rafi Fernandez, Mridula Baljekar, and Manisha Kanani. Lately I have been baking my seitan, but I decided to try the Simple Simmered Seitan recipe from "1,000 Vegan Recipes" by Robin Roberts. The ingredients might already be in your kitchen- olive oil, soy sauce, garlic, and vital wheat gluten flower. I had everything I needed on hand except onion powder, so I substituted asafoetida. If you've never smelled asafoetida, it's quite an interesting spice. I usually hear that it smells like a stinky foot, but I think it smells like cat urine. Don't worry though, the smell goes away when cooked, and it has an onion-garlic flavor rather than a foot-urine flavor!

Robin Roberts says in the cookbook that she usually makes a double batch and freezes some of it. Sounded like a perfect idea to me, so I did the same. After mixing the dough, I had a little bit too much liquid, so I poured some of it out and added a bit of vital wheat gluten. That solved the problem, and left me with a big hunk of baby seitan.


I cut the dough into eight roughly equal pieces and put them in the simmering liquid in a giant pot. At first the dough sunk to the bottom of the bowl, but after some time it began to rise to the top.


After about 45 minutes of simmering, I realized I should have used two large pots. The seitan had doubled in size and it looked like the pot would overflow with seitan cutlets!


Once an hour of simmering had passed, I turned off the heat and let the seitan cool down a bit while I prepped the ingredients for the Chicken Korma. I also tore off a few pieces of seitan to munch on. The seitan was very lightly spiced and would work well in a variety of recipes. If you made the seitan with a specific recipe in mind, you could easily add spices to the dough with your meal in mind. I think boiled seitan works much better than baked seitan in the stir-frys and Indian meals I make. Baked seitan is much more dense, and it is better to use as sausage, pepperoni, or ground meat.

I have about 3 pounds of seitan left in my fridge, so I shouldn't need more seitan for a while. But when I do run out, I'm looking forward to experimenting with difference spices in this basic seitan recipe.

Seitan O'Greatness

I finally tried the famous Seitan O'Greatness that was first posted on The Post Punk Kitchen forums a couple years ago by Lachesis. It takes no more than 10 minutes of active time (so easy!), although you have to wait an hour and a half for it to bake. It's worth the wait though. The result is a chewy, spicy, pepperoni-esque log of protein. The texture is much better than you'll get from boiled seitan. I haven't tried it in any dishes yet, but I think it would be great ground up or chopped up in a spicy Indian or Mexican dish. Don't have the vegetarian Worcestshire sauce or tomato paste? No biggie- just substitute soy sauce and ketchup, respectively.

Seitan O'Greatness

• 1.5 cups vital wheat gluten
• 1/4 cup nutritional yeast
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 tsp paprika
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp cumin
• 1-2 tsp pepper (I used 2 tsp)
• 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper (or less if you don't want it spicy)
• 1/8 tsp allspice
• 2 tsp garlic powder
• 3/4 cups water
• 4 tbsp tomato paste
• 1 tbsp tamari
• 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 2 tbsp vegetarian Worcestershire sauce

Preheat oven to 325°.

In a large mixing bowl mix dry ingredients (the first 10 ingredients). Mix the liquid ingredients (the rest of the ingredients) in a smaller mixing bowl and mix well.

Add the liquid ingredients to the dry ingredients. Mix well, then knead for a couple of minutes. It shouldn't stick to your hands.

Form into a log (6-8" long), wrap tightly in foil, twisting ends. Bake for 90 minutes. When done baking, unwrap and leave out to cool all the way. Then wrap it in foil or plastic and refrigerate. Slice to use as desired.