Curried Udon Noodle Stir Fry

This was a nice, basic stir fry that was good and acceptably tasty, but not overly delicious and with an obvious lack of depth of flavor.

With that said, though, I actually would make it again but would probably doctor it up a bit more with maybe a little bit of curry powder. And frankly, the way I douse on cayenne pepper on most of my meals anyway, I don't necessarily need the dish to have a ton of flavor. Actually, the less flavor in the dish the more I can actually taste the cayenne.

The seitan was "interesting." I've used their boil method but this dish was the first time I tried their oven method. I expected the seitan to be a little drier and meatier, but it was actually quite rubbery. That was, until I sauteed the crap out of it and gave it a nice brown crust. That helped decrease the rubberiness and increase the chewiness (in fact, the next night I took the leftover seitan, cubed it, sauteed the hell out of it in some garlic and oil and put in on pizza. It was just like "beef" jerky. Delicious!)

Cost: About $9-$10.

Difficulty: Moderate. This required 3 primary cooking dishes.

Modifications: Powdered instead of fresh ginger. Regular soy sauce instead of shoyu, which I couldn't find.

Cleanup: Not too bad, but not quick and easy.

This recipe is on page 200 of Veganomicon.

Seitan Picatta With Olives and Green Beans

This was quite the "stick to your ribs" sorta dish, but with a fresh twist.

The base was a delicious veganized rich, garlic mashed potato recipe I got from Cook's Country. And the main ingredient of battered seitan is something one can rarely go wrong with, this not being an exception to that rule. The potatoes and seitan were the heavy half, while the freshness of the green beans, shallots and lemon juice were the lighter half of the dish. And the olives and capers added a needed salty kick.

The assembled plate looked like a freaky science experiment that was growing sparse, thick-follicled green hair. I think I put it together as they suggested, but since we were the only ones looking at it and it was two minutes I'll never get back, the second round was just a pile of green beans plopped on top.

All in all, this was a lovely, nutritious and tasty meal. Time will tell if I make it again, since it wasn't a total standout.

If you're going to make the seitan on the same day as the main dish, do this on a weekend or a day you have off. Otherwise, be prepared to eat a late dinner.

Difficulty: Moderate. A decent amount of chopping and preparation.
Cleanup: So so. Not easy but not the worst.
Alterations: I used dried parsley on top. Hey, parsley is expensive here, especially for just a garnish.
Price: About $10-11.

This recipe is on page 174 of Veganomicon.

Almost All-American Seitan PotPie

Bryan said this was probably one of the best potpie's he's ever had. I had to agree with him. The crust was crusty and chewy, the filling hot and savory and the seitan meaty and dense.

But if you're going to make this, either plan it out over two days or prepare to spend 3 - 3 1/2 hours making it in one day. The good news is that although it took that long to make from start to finish, nothing was that difficult and a lot of the time was waiting time.

Although we've had our own seitan recipe for a while, and it's one we actually love, the one in the book (page 131) was even a little easier and the end result we thought a little better. It was more dense and meaty than our other recipe. However, I just made this again yesterday for Thanksgiving and it was a lot more soft and wet than the first time. I probably just had too much liquid. But after squeezing some out after cooking and then sauteing it the texture was much more solid.

I loved the filling with the hint of mustard flavor and the background of the sage and thyme. It was the a great consistency, too, with the small dice to most of the veggies, to me, a better derivation of potpie.

The only thing I had trouble with was rolling out the dough. But I've done very little of that and once Bryan helped me out I saw how easy it was to get it shaped the way I wanted. I ended up using a smaller casserole dish (they say 3 quarts, but I'd recommend something smaller...maybe 2 quarts) but rolled the dough out to fit a bigger one, so I just doubled it up on top. It made a thick crust, which we both really like.

We will be making this one again, but most definitely on a quiet and chilly weekend.

This recipe is on page 159 of Veganomicon.