Food

Do you have a recipe you can post, I'm interested in making Seitan

How to make seitan yourself

You'll need wheat flour (some say whole grain is good, some say the cheapest is best), water, and salt for the seitan itself.

And for a stock to cook / steep it in you'll need an onion, garlic, spices / chili / vegetables, well, whatever you like, really.
The seitan will taste pretty much like the stock tastes, so go figure.
Do as you like, in the end it should be a bit too spicey, a bit too salty and a bit too hot.

A rather large bowl, and a colander that fits in it is very helpful.

Make dough:
Put a kilo of flour (or a half maybe, if you're doing it for the first time; will be easier to get it right) in your bowl,
mix well with two or three tablespoons of salt using a fork.
Add water, mix with fork, add more water, mix, water, mix... until the stuff doesn't stick to the bottom of the bowl any more.
Empty bowl, and move dough to floured worktop; flour hands, and knead like a madman with the heels of your hands,
adding flour from time to time, until the dough is not sticking to your hands anymore.
Fill your bowl with lukewarm water, put the dough in it, and let it wait there until the stock is ready.

Make stock:
Well, as said above.
I usually begin with roasting a cubed onion gently, adding a vegetable bouillon cube,
or whatever vegetables I have in my fridge.
Spices and vegetable-wise you can go in any direction you want. It's good to stick to a theme, so to say,
and be straightforward, and brave. Dare to make it too spicey.
Add water, simmer for twenty minutes or so.
The goal is to have about two litres of spicey stock in the end.

Wash dough:
What you basically do is wash most of the starch out of the dough by kneading it underwater,
until the dough has transformed into a strange spongy / gooey / elastic/ a bit rubber-like stuff - seitan!
The trick seems to be the way you wash (knead) the dough.
Watch this
- for a guide on how to do it.
The more homogeneous the thing is in the end, the better.
Yes, it will feel strange.

Infuse Seitan
Cook that lump vigorously in your prepared stock for ten minutes - as a whole, cut up in chunks / nuggets / stripes, whatever you like.
Let simmer for another ten to twenty minutes (kind of depending on what you are planning to do with it later,
and on how big you lump is / your chunks / nuggets / stripes / whatever are).
It should still be rather "al dente" as you will be cooking it one more time.

Let cool, and keep in refrigerator for a day, preferably in an airtight container,
so seitan has time to bathe in your stock and absorb flavour.

Make a meal
Not much of a recipe here. Until now i have made kind of a vegetarian goulash most of the time.
It's definitely a good idea to sear seitan on high heat with a little oil, before adding stuff.
Soy sauce is really good with it. There are recipes where they put it right in the dough.
I like chipotle tabasco with it.
Eat with whatever vegetables you like.
If you cook everything together in a wok as I do, make sure to keep it rather dry,
or your seitan will get soggy.

Enjoy!

If anybody has any suggestions / recipes - please post!