Basic Seitan Recipe

Dry Ingredients:

3 c vital wheat gluten

¼ nutritional yeast

herbs/spices of choice (I use garlic and onion powder, oregano and basil, and crushed red pepper)

Optional for extra texture: ¼- ½ c finely minced vegetables

chickpea flour to stiffen batter as needed

Wet Ingredients:

2 c vegetable broth (add some salt or 2-3 tablespoons of soy sauce if you use low sodium broth)

2 T unsweetened ketchup or tomato paste

2 T apple cider vinegar or other acid

½ c canned white beans

 

Instructions:

Mash the beans in a bowl until they form a paste. Set aside. Mix together all dry ingredients (except the chickpea flour) in a large bowl (leave out the beans). Whisk the ketchup, broth, and vinegar together until well blended. Form a well in the center of the dry ingredients, and slowly pour the liquid into the well. Add the beans. Blend everything together with a fork until the mixture becomes difficult to stir, then knead it all for as long as you can stand to do so. The more you knead, the less doughy and more meat-like your seitan will be. You can adjust the liquid and gluten ratios as needed, based on how the dough feels, and based on your own preference for seitan texture.

Once kneaded, form the dough into logs or loaves of the desired size, and wrap tightly with foil (2 layers is sometimes best—the seitan will expand when heated and needs to be tightly confined to maintain its shape). Bake at 350 for 40 minutes to one hour, until the loaves are firm to touch but still spring back slightly when you press on them. Let cool on a cooling rack, then remove from foil and serve.

Here's a picture of the finished product. Not the most glamorous thing, I know, but it's good protein, a good source of B12 from the nutritional yeast, and it's much cheaper than seitan from Whole Foods!

 Note: I shaped this one into a log, but I also shape it into a loaf for easy lunchmeat slices. The little red specks are red kidney beans (which I used because I ran out of white beans).