Second Entry
This next dish requires some 'splainin'.
I get tired of picking out what to make all the time. I worry (unnecessarily, I know, because he eats everything) that Bruce will be bored with what I choose (because I choose things that are to MY taste, obviously). So I gave him a cookbook (Vegan with a Vengeance) and told him to pick something. He ended up with two recipes -- the polenta recipe in my previous entry, and this one: Cold Udon Noodles with Peanut Sauce and Seitan.
This was a semi-complicated dish, but I love complicated (even if it does take every dish or pot that I own). I will definitely make it again (we both give it five stars), but I will do some things differently to make it simpler without impacting the five-star appeal. The sauce was heaven.
First, let's talk about some of the ingredients.
Seitan. It's one of those vegetarian things that I hadn't gotten around to tasting until now. I eat tofu constantly, tempeh occasionally -- but not seitan. Seitan is made from wheat gluten -- the protein part of wheat. It's sometimes called "wheat meat" because it can have a very meaty texture. Traditionally it's made by washing and kneading flour over a period of days until the starch dissolves and the gluten is left -- but we've got an easier way. I purchased "vital wheat gluten flour" (at Publix in the "healthy foods" section that has all of those Bob's Red Mill flours and such). The recipe for seitan makes six cups. I only needed two for the noodle dish and didn't know if we'd like it, so I cut the recipe into thirds and just made what I'd use. Bruce loved it, so I should've made more. It was not hard, though, and it was kind of fun to make, so I'll do it again.
Udon noodles. They're a thick sort of noodle -- you could substitute linguine and nobody'd know. I bought whole wheat, of course. Publix did not have them, but I got them at Earth Fare.
Okay -- making the seitan (it's pronounced "say-tahn"). I am making another seitan dish tomorrow with it baked instead of boiled, so I'll let you know how that goes. Making it this way it was...difficult to describe. Not tough or chewy...not too different from a dumpling, although it was denser than that. A little spongy, maybe. Hmmm. Anyway, it can be made and kept for five or six days, so this would definitely be a do-ahead step to keep the final preparations simpler. Again -- this recipe makes about six cups of seitan, but when I did it I just used a third of everything.
Seitan
2 cups vital wheat gluten flour
1/4 cup nutritional yeast
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 cup cold water or vegetable broth
1/2 cup soy sauce
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 cloves garlic, pressed or grated on a microplane grater
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
Broth:
12 cups water or vegetable broth
1/2 cup soy sauce
In a large bowl mix together the vital wheat gluten flour, nutritional yeast, and all-purpose flour. In a separate bowl mix together the wet ingredients through the lemon zest.
Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and combine with a firm spatula. Knead the dough for about five minutes until spongy and elastic.
[Okay, I have to tell you about this. One of the things I love about cooking is that magic moment when things...change. You know -- the pudding is never going to boil and thicken and then, suddenly, it's pudding. This was one of those moments. I put this...stuff on a cutting board to knead it (there wasn't much, remember) and it was weird. Not soupy, but NOT like a dough that you would knead. Spongy, maybe, but NOT elastic. Remember when you knead bread dough, you are developing the gluten which gives bread its delightful texture. So I dutifully (if skeptically) kept kneading and then -- suddenly! -- magic happened and it became different. Definitely elastic. I love that. :) ]
Let the dough rest for a couple of minutes. In the meantime, stir together the ingredients for the broth in a large saucepot (do not boil the broth at this point).
Roll the dough into a log shape about ten inches long and cut it into six pieces of roughly equal size [so -- my "roll" was a little over three inches and I just had two pieces]. Place the pieces in the broth. It is important that the broth be very cold when you add the dough, which makes for a nicer texture and ensures that the seitan doesn't fall apart. [Mine was room temperature, which seemed cold enough to me!] Partially cover the pot (leave a little space for steam to escape) and bring the broth to a boil.
When the broth has come to a boil, set the heat to low and gently simmer for an hour, turning the pieces every now and then. [Because I am impatient, I had the broth on high, but cut it down to very low just before it came to a boil. I meant to turn the pieces, but I forgot, so they only got flipped once.]
Turn off the heat and let the broth and seitan cool for at least thirty minutes. This will produce a firmer seitan. It is best to let everything cool completely before removing the seitan from the broth.
What you do next depends on the recipe you're using. If storing the seitan for later use, slice it into bite-sized chunks, put it into a resealable container, and cover with broth. Seal the container and place in the fridge for up to five days.
Now, the noodle recipe:
Cold Udon Noodles with Peanut Sauce and Seitan
For the Peanut Sauce:
2 teaspoons peanut oil
2 cloves minced garlic
2 tablespoons minced ginger [use the fresh -- it made a huge difference]
1 cup water
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon ground coriander
2/3 cup smooth all-natural peanut butter
2 tablespoons pure maple syrup
3 tablespoons rice vinegar
2 teaspoons Asian chile sauce (available in the Asian section of most grocery stores; hot sauce is an okay substitution)
For the Seitan:
1 pound seitan (2 cups) sliced into 1/4-inch strips [mine were accidentally thicker -- accidentally because I just saw this as I typed it!]
1 tablespoon peanut oil
1 clove garlic
2 teaspoons soy sauce
To Serve:
10 ounces udon noodles
1/4 cup black sesame seeds (optional) [I got these at Earth Fare and think they added something, so I would use regular sesame seeds if I couldn't find the black ones rather than leave it out]
1 seedless cucumber, halved across, sliced into matchsticks
4 cups mung bean sprouts
1 red bell pepper, thinly sliced
2 cups scallions, chopped
several lime wedges for serving
Make the peanut sauce:
In a saucepan saute the garlic and ginger in peanut oil over low-medium heat. Add the water, soy sauce, and coriander and bring to a boil. Add the peanut butter and turn the heat to low. Whisk well until the peanut butter and oil are combined. Mix in the maple syrup, vinegar, and chile sauce. Remove from heat and let cool to room temperature.
Make the noodles:
Meanwhile, prepare the udon noodles according to package directions. When noodles have cooked, drain them in a colander and rinse them under cold water until they are cool to the touch. Let them rest in the colander and prepare the seitan.
Saute the seitan slices in the peanut oil for five minutes on each side or until the seitan is browned and yummy. Then saute with the garlic for a minute, sprinkle with the soy sauce, and saute again for thirty seconds or so.
At this point, your peanut sauce should be at room temperature. Give the noodles a final rinse under cold water to make them cold and also keep them from sticking together.
To serve:
Place the noodles on a large platter. Pour the peanut sauce over the noodles, then sprinkle with sesame seeds. Scatter the cucumbers, bean sprouts, and peppers on top, followed by the scallions. Place the warm seitan on top and place lime wedges around the circumference and gosh darn it you've got yourself a fine-looking meal. If you would prefer to serve on individual plates to keep the greedy people from stealing all the seitan then just follow the directions dividing everything among four to six plates.
Okay -- those are her instructions (which I followed). Now -- what I would do differently next time. But first, pictures (one before the seitan and another after):
That's a platter, not a dinner plate. She's crazy if she thinks this makes four servings -- they would be HUGE servings. But it is a beautiful dish that I would serve to company.
Serving it like this was really difficult. We ended up cutting wedges and sliding a spatula under the wedge and transferring it to a plate. You can't see how TALL this dish is in this shot -- but look at all the vegetables in the ingredients list and you'll get an idea. Next time I will get my biggest bowl and I'll toss everything together. I might use slightly fewer veggies, too. After tossing the noodles, sauce, and veggies, I'll either put the seitan on the top or I'll just serve it on the side. If you're serving it to company, I'd do all the tossing at the table, so everyone can see the pretty veggies before they get covered up by the peanut sauce. This is one dish, by the way, that actually has enough sauce in it to satisfy me. She insists that the noodles and veggies have to be cold, the sauce room temperature, and the seitan warm -- and tossing everything will kind of make the sauce/noodle/veggie temperature differential disappear, but that's okay with me. Another thing that I might not do next time is when you are browning the seitan and you add garlic and soy sauce at the end. I'm not sure what this did. The garlic kind of glopped in one spot and cooked too fast and there is already plenty of soy sauce in the seitan, so I would skip that altogether.
Definitely a good -- if not low fat -- dish. :)
More later...
I get tired of picking out what to make all the time. I worry (unnecessarily, I know, because he eats everything) that Bruce will be bored with what I choose (because I choose things that are to MY taste, obviously). So I gave him a cookbook (Vegan with a Vengeance) and told him to pick something. He ended up with two recipes -- the polenta recipe in my previous entry, and this one: Cold Udon Noodles with Peanut Sauce and Seitan.
This was a semi-complicated dish, but I love complicated (even if it does take every dish or pot that I own). I will definitely make it again (we both give it five stars), but I will do some things differently to make it simpler without impacting the five-star appeal. The sauce was heaven.
First, let's talk about some of the ingredients.
Seitan. It's one of those vegetarian things that I hadn't gotten around to tasting until now. I eat tofu constantly, tempeh occasionally -- but not seitan. Seitan is made from wheat gluten -- the protein part of wheat. It's sometimes called "wheat meat" because it can have a very meaty texture. Traditionally it's made by washing and kneading flour over a period of days until the starch dissolves and the gluten is left -- but we've got an easier way. I purchased "vital wheat gluten flour" (at Publix in the "healthy foods" section that has all of those Bob's Red Mill flours and such). The recipe for seitan makes six cups. I only needed two for the noodle dish and didn't know if we'd like it, so I cut the recipe into thirds and just made what I'd use. Bruce loved it, so I should've made more. It was not hard, though, and it was kind of fun to make, so I'll do it again.
Udon noodles. They're a thick sort of noodle -- you could substitute linguine and nobody'd know. I bought whole wheat, of course. Publix did not have them, but I got them at Earth Fare.
Okay -- making the seitan (it's pronounced "say-tahn"). I am making another seitan dish tomorrow with it baked instead of boiled, so I'll let you know how that goes. Making it this way it was...difficult to describe. Not tough or chewy...not too different from a dumpling, although it was denser than that. A little spongy, maybe. Hmmm. Anyway, it can be made and kept for five or six days, so this would definitely be a do-ahead step to keep the final preparations simpler. Again -- this recipe makes about six cups of seitan, but when I did it I just used a third of everything.
Seitan
2 cups vital wheat gluten flour
1/4 cup nutritional yeast
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 cup cold water or vegetable broth
1/2 cup soy sauce
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 cloves garlic, pressed or grated on a microplane grater
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
Broth:
12 cups water or vegetable broth
1/2 cup soy sauce
In a large bowl mix together the vital wheat gluten flour, nutritional yeast, and all-purpose flour. In a separate bowl mix together the wet ingredients through the lemon zest.
Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and combine with a firm spatula. Knead the dough for about five minutes until spongy and elastic.
[Okay, I have to tell you about this. One of the things I love about cooking is that magic moment when things...change. You know -- the pudding is never going to boil and thicken and then, suddenly, it's pudding. This was one of those moments. I put this...stuff on a cutting board to knead it (there wasn't much, remember) and it was weird. Not soupy, but NOT like a dough that you would knead. Spongy, maybe, but NOT elastic. Remember when you knead bread dough, you are developing the gluten which gives bread its delightful texture. So I dutifully (if skeptically) kept kneading and then -- suddenly! -- magic happened and it became different. Definitely elastic. I love that. :) ]
Let the dough rest for a couple of minutes. In the meantime, stir together the ingredients for the broth in a large saucepot (do not boil the broth at this point).
Roll the dough into a log shape about ten inches long and cut it into six pieces of roughly equal size [so -- my "roll" was a little over three inches and I just had two pieces]. Place the pieces in the broth. It is important that the broth be very cold when you add the dough, which makes for a nicer texture and ensures that the seitan doesn't fall apart. [Mine was room temperature, which seemed cold enough to me!] Partially cover the pot (leave a little space for steam to escape) and bring the broth to a boil.
When the broth has come to a boil, set the heat to low and gently simmer for an hour, turning the pieces every now and then. [Because I am impatient, I had the broth on high, but cut it down to very low just before it came to a boil. I meant to turn the pieces, but I forgot, so they only got flipped once.]
Turn off the heat and let the broth and seitan cool for at least thirty minutes. This will produce a firmer seitan. It is best to let everything cool completely before removing the seitan from the broth.
What you do next depends on the recipe you're using. If storing the seitan for later use, slice it into bite-sized chunks, put it into a resealable container, and cover with broth. Seal the container and place in the fridge for up to five days.
Now, the noodle recipe:
Cold Udon Noodles with Peanut Sauce and Seitan
For the Peanut Sauce:
2 teaspoons peanut oil
2 cloves minced garlic
2 tablespoons minced ginger [use the fresh -- it made a huge difference]
1 cup water
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon ground coriander
2/3 cup smooth all-natural peanut butter
2 tablespoons pure maple syrup
3 tablespoons rice vinegar
2 teaspoons Asian chile sauce (available in the Asian section of most grocery stores; hot sauce is an okay substitution)
For the Seitan:
1 pound seitan (2 cups) sliced into 1/4-inch strips [mine were accidentally thicker -- accidentally because I just saw this as I typed it!]
1 tablespoon peanut oil
1 clove garlic
2 teaspoons soy sauce
To Serve:
10 ounces udon noodles
1/4 cup black sesame seeds (optional) [I got these at Earth Fare and think they added something, so I would use regular sesame seeds if I couldn't find the black ones rather than leave it out]
1 seedless cucumber, halved across, sliced into matchsticks
4 cups mung bean sprouts
1 red bell pepper, thinly sliced
2 cups scallions, chopped
several lime wedges for serving
Make the peanut sauce:
In a saucepan saute the garlic and ginger in peanut oil over low-medium heat. Add the water, soy sauce, and coriander and bring to a boil. Add the peanut butter and turn the heat to low. Whisk well until the peanut butter and oil are combined. Mix in the maple syrup, vinegar, and chile sauce. Remove from heat and let cool to room temperature.
Make the noodles:
Meanwhile, prepare the udon noodles according to package directions. When noodles have cooked, drain them in a colander and rinse them under cold water until they are cool to the touch. Let them rest in the colander and prepare the seitan.
Saute the seitan slices in the peanut oil for five minutes on each side or until the seitan is browned and yummy. Then saute with the garlic for a minute, sprinkle with the soy sauce, and saute again for thirty seconds or so.
At this point, your peanut sauce should be at room temperature. Give the noodles a final rinse under cold water to make them cold and also keep them from sticking together.
To serve:
Place the noodles on a large platter. Pour the peanut sauce over the noodles, then sprinkle with sesame seeds. Scatter the cucumbers, bean sprouts, and peppers on top, followed by the scallions. Place the warm seitan on top and place lime wedges around the circumference and gosh darn it you've got yourself a fine-looking meal. If you would prefer to serve on individual plates to keep the greedy people from stealing all the seitan then just follow the directions dividing everything among four to six plates.
Okay -- those are her instructions (which I followed). Now -- what I would do differently next time. But first, pictures (one before the seitan and another after):
That's a platter, not a dinner plate. She's crazy if she thinks this makes four servings -- they would be HUGE servings. But it is a beautiful dish that I would serve to company.
Serving it like this was really difficult. We ended up cutting wedges and sliding a spatula under the wedge and transferring it to a plate. You can't see how TALL this dish is in this shot -- but look at all the vegetables in the ingredients list and you'll get an idea. Next time I will get my biggest bowl and I'll toss everything together. I might use slightly fewer veggies, too. After tossing the noodles, sauce, and veggies, I'll either put the seitan on the top or I'll just serve it on the side. If you're serving it to company, I'd do all the tossing at the table, so everyone can see the pretty veggies before they get covered up by the peanut sauce. This is one dish, by the way, that actually has enough sauce in it to satisfy me. She insists that the noodles and veggies have to be cold, the sauce room temperature, and the seitan warm -- and tossing everything will kind of make the sauce/noodle/veggie temperature differential disappear, but that's okay with me. Another thing that I might not do next time is when you are browning the seitan and you add garlic and soy sauce at the end. I'm not sure what this did. The garlic kind of glopped in one spot and cooked too fast and there is already plenty of soy sauce in the seitan, so I would skip that altogether.
Definitely a good -- if not low fat -- dish. :)
More later...