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My vegan office mate keeps pushing this stuff. She loves it. Apparently it’s entirely wheat gluten or something. I have to keep reminding her that I have Celiac, but you know how vegans are.
Tempeh and TVP are soybean products and also really good.
They’re proteins with a meat-adjacent texture and a blank slate for flavor.
But seitan crisps up soooo good. There is this place near me that has these Korean seitan “boneless ribs” type thing with some wasabi/mustard sauce and my apologies to your sphincter but they would be worth it to try.
If you can afford to gamble $25 on the advice of an Internet stranger, do this:
Buy a 4lb bag of Vital Wheat gluten. (Can be aquired on Anthony’s Goods website.)
Mix it about 50-50 with water, and just… do stuff with it.
Example1: Mix 350 grams of gluten powder with 450 grams of water (Optional 5 grams of MSG) and stir it together until it’s a big blob. Pick it up and stretch it in every possible direction and knead the absolute shit out of it. Divide into 7 portions, and place on a greased cookie sheet. Bake at 250°F/120°C for about 2 hours. You now have a 50 grams of protein blob for each day of the week, to be sliced and dovided however you wish throughout the day.
Example2: Get a ripping hot skillet and dump in Some™ gluten powder and Approximately® twice as much water and vigorously stir it with, like, a fork or something like that, and dump some cooking oil on it as an afterthought, and dump some spices in it and boil off all the water to make a fake Taco meat mix. If it sticks, take it off the heat and add a splash of water to unstick it, and it’s okay to jave juicy taco seitan crumbles. You actually cannot fuck this up.
Tried extracting gluten from flour before, then found out it doesn’t work with wholemeal flour. Could try it again sometime, got white flour now because it was all I could get hold of.
Definitely use bread flour if you make it yourself. The higher the protein, the better, because the protein is what you’re getting out of it.
To get 4lbs of gluten (dry weight), you’ll need 30lbs of white flour. You’ll get seitan for about half the price if you make it yourself (assuming flour is $0.50 per pound)… but I honestly think it’s so cheap that it’s worth it to buy the pre-processed gluten powder. Also because I’ve tried making it myself from flour, and I just don’t get good results.
4lbs of gluten is 4lbs of pure protein. If you eat 50 grams per day, it’ll last 36 days.
I’ve made the seitan recipe printed on the back of Bob’s Red Mill brand vital wheat gluten, and it had a taste and texture similar to bologna. It was actually pretty nice cold in a sandwich, and fried up in a pan. If that doesn’t float your boat, there’s about a billion ways to prepare beans, you’re bound to like one of those.
I’m a fussy autist too, and I absolutely love soya, probably because it’s so bland and umami. I used to make my own soya burgers. Tofu is lovely chopped, mixed with sweetcorn and thyme, wrapped in filo pastry parcels and baked. Apparently you can make tofu at home with lemon juice as the curdling agent. If I ever get my own place, I’d love to try it.
Tempeh looks like brains, and I spent weeks looking at the jar before I plucked up the courage to try it. It turns out it’s really nice just breaded and baked. But the ones jarred in water taste better than the vacuum packed ones, which I’ve found to have more bitterness, even after steaming or boiling.
Making tempeh at home is a lot trickier as it uses fermentation.
Ironically, switching to a plant based diet in 2014 actually expanded the variety of food I ate by A LOT. Before that it was just potatoes and more potatoes, and if my executive dysfunction didn’t get me, maybe a bit of boiled veg.
Seitan is pretty good, my only issue with it in a sando or with noodles is like… you’re basically having wheat with wheat, it’s too much for me. But served with vegetables and sauce, it’s probably my favorite meat replacement
I might have to go vegetarian if this is the future of meat thanks to Trump.
Come, join us, as we feast on seitan.
Hail Seitan!
My vegan office mate keeps pushing this stuff. She loves it. Apparently it’s entirely wheat gluten or something. I have to keep reminding her that I have Celiac, but you know how vegans are.
Tempeh and TVP are soybean products and also really good.
They’re proteins with a meat-adjacent texture and a blank slate for flavor.
But seitan crisps up soooo good. There is this place near me that has these Korean seitan “boneless ribs” type thing with some wasabi/mustard sauce and my apologies to your sphincter but they would be worth it to try.
If you can afford to gamble $25 on the advice of an Internet stranger, do this:
Buy a 4lb bag of Vital Wheat gluten. (Can be aquired on Anthony’s Goods website.)
Mix it about 50-50 with water, and just… do stuff with it.
Example1: Mix 350 grams of gluten powder with 450 grams of water (Optional 5 grams of MSG) and stir it together until it’s a big blob. Pick it up and stretch it in every possible direction and knead the absolute shit out of it. Divide into 7 portions, and place on a greased cookie sheet. Bake at 250°F/120°C for about 2 hours. You now have a 50 grams of protein blob for each day of the week, to be sliced and dovided however you wish throughout the day.
Example2: Get a ripping hot skillet and dump in Some™ gluten powder and Approximately® twice as much water and vigorously stir it with, like, a fork or something like that, and dump some cooking oil on it as an afterthought, and dump some spices in it and boil off all the water to make a fake Taco meat mix. If it sticks, take it off the heat and add a splash of water to unstick it, and it’s okay to jave juicy taco seitan crumbles. You actually cannot fuck this up.
Enjoy.
Eat beans! Vast majority of people are getting too little fiber. Don’t think wheat gluten has any either.
Yes, eat more than one kind of thing, obviously.
Tried extracting gluten from flour before, then found out it doesn’t work with wholemeal flour. Could try it again sometime, got white flour now because it was all I could get hold of.
Definitely use bread flour if you make it yourself. The higher the protein, the better, because the protein is what you’re getting out of it.
To get 4lbs of gluten (dry weight), you’ll need 30lbs of white flour. You’ll get seitan for about half the price if you make it yourself (assuming flour is $0.50 per pound)… but I honestly think it’s so cheap that it’s worth it to buy the pre-processed gluten powder. Also because I’ve tried making it myself from flour, and I just don’t get good results.
4lbs of gluten is 4lbs of pure protein. If you eat 50 grams per day, it’ll last 36 days.
Will have to see if I like that, that sounds strange but probably better than Trump meat
I’ve made the seitan recipe printed on the back of Bob’s Red Mill brand vital wheat gluten, and it had a taste and texture similar to bologna. It was actually pretty nice cold in a sandwich, and fried up in a pan. If that doesn’t float your boat, there’s about a billion ways to prepare beans, you’re bound to like one of those.
I’m a picky eater (thanks, autism) but I’m sure I will find something that works for me. Thanks for the tips
I’m a fussy autist too, and I absolutely love soya, probably because it’s so bland and umami. I used to make my own soya burgers. Tofu is lovely chopped, mixed with sweetcorn and thyme, wrapped in filo pastry parcels and baked. Apparently you can make tofu at home with lemon juice as the curdling agent. If I ever get my own place, I’d love to try it.
Tempeh looks like brains, and I spent weeks looking at the jar before I plucked up the courage to try it. It turns out it’s really nice just breaded and baked. But the ones jarred in water taste better than the vacuum packed ones, which I’ve found to have more bitterness, even after steaming or boiling.
Making tempeh at home is a lot trickier as it uses fermentation.
Ironically, switching to a plant based diet in 2014 actually expanded the variety of food I ate by A LOT. Before that it was just potatoes and more potatoes, and if my executive dysfunction didn’t get me, maybe a bit of boiled veg.
yeah, i’ll certainly see what happens.
Seitan is pretty good, my only issue with it in a sando or with noodles is like… you’re basically having wheat with wheat, it’s too much for me. But served with vegetables and sauce, it’s probably my favorite meat replacement
Switch to rye bread and rice noodles and problem solved.