Sometimes I’m in the mood for a big ol’ slab of protein… seitan, that is!

A couple of days ago, I made Matt’s recipe for Chickeny seitan cutlets. I tweaked the spices slightly (I omitted the bay leaf and instead added celery seed and freshly ground pepper); used regular tofu instead of silken; and made half a recipe.

I like this recipe because it involves cooking the seitan cutlets in broth in the oven. This is easier than cooking them in a pot on the hob, where inattention can mean the difference between seitan cutlets and seitan brains. I checked them after about an hour, and they still seemed a long way from cooked, so I increased the temperature to 180C (350F). That did the trick and they were perfectly cooked in a total of just over 1-1/2 hours.

I then dusted the cutlets with flour and panfried them.

We served them with Mr Thrifty’s special mash, creamy mushroom gravy and a red cabbage salad from Epicurious.

The cutlets were delicious, tender and tasty, and the gravy was a perfect accompaniment. As for Mr Thrifty’s mash… well let’s just say, this is the mash that turned me into a mashed potato lover. The salad, I have to admit, was not my favourite; the flavours just didn’t seem to work together very well.

The best thing about the cutlets is that there were four left over. Yesterday I thinly sliced two of them to use as chickeny strips in Buddha bowls, and they were excellent in that role as well.

So when you have a few minutes, go and check out Matt’s blog My Veggie Kitchen, he’s got a lot of great vegan recipes.

Creamy mushroom gravy

1. Reserve two tablespoons of the bouillon and heat the rest in a small pot over medium heat. As it is heating, add the nutritional yeast, soy sauce, thyme, and salt & pepper to taste.

2. Meanwhile, mix the cornflour (cornstarch) into the reserved bouillon and set aside.

3. When the bouillon in the pot comes to a simmer, give the cornflour/bouillon mixture a stir and add it to the pot, whisking continuously, and bring again to a simmer, whisking all the while. The mixture will thicken as the cornflour cooks.

4. Whisk in the optional cream cheese until incorporated.

5. Add sliced mushrooms and stir. Cover, turn heat to low, and cook at a gentle simmer until mushrooms are cooked, about five minutes.

Edit: I had one of these burgers for lunch, reheated from frozen, and it totally fell apart in the pan. Argh. I still need to work on the cohesiveness. It tasted fantastic, though.

I had another go at making the nutty wild rice burgers I’d first made a few months back.

This version held together better, and the tweaks I made to the seasonings worked well. The chewy rice is a nice contrast to the crunchy nuts and seeds.

This probably won’t be my final version of this burger, but because I’ve had a couple of requests for the recipe, I’m posting this latest version.

Enjoy!

Nutty wild rice burgers

* For two cups of well-cooked brown basmati / wild rice blend, start with 70g (3/8 cup) raw brown basmati plus 40g (3 tablespoons) raw wild rice, cooked in a generous amount of boiling salted water for about 50-55 minutes, then drained.

1. Heat the olive oil in a heavy skillet and saute the onion and mushroom for 5 minutes, until softened. Add garlic and continue to cook for another minute or two.

2. In a large mixing bowl, combine cooked vegetables with rice, sunflower seeds, sesame seeds and walnuts. Mix well.

3. Add vegan cheese and breadcrumbs and mix again.

4. In a small bowl, whisk together soy sauce, besan and arrowroot or cornflour (cornstarch). Add to mixing bowl and combine well.

5. Divide mixture into four portions and shape into burgers.

6. Saute in a bit of olive oil until lightly browned on each side.

Makes four burgers.

First off, for any of my American readers who may be thinking, “a flapjack is a pancake, and that’s not a pancake”, let me assure you that the delectable goodie in the photo above is indeed a flapjack… at least on this side of the pond. We have only one word for pancakes over here, although I should perhaps mention that an American pancake is different from an English pancake, just as an American muffin is different from an English muffin.

A flapjack is a snack bar made from oatmeal, margarine and sweeteners — usually golden syrup and sugar (or honey). Common additions are dried fruit, nuts and chocolate.

Commercial flapjacks are very popular, and can be bought pretty much anywhere. For anyone unfamiliar with just how popular flapjacks are, check out the Blackfriars Bakery website, which lists 23 different varieties of flapjacks. Commercial flapjacks are usually VERY sweet and sometimes contain questionable ingredients. They’re often not vegan either, although vegan varieties are available.

These homemade flapjacks are moist & chewy and just bursting with oaty goodness. They don’t just taste as good as the commercial variety, they taste better! They’re also very cheap and easy to make.

Furthermore, making homemade flapjacks means eliminating the plastic wrap that commercial ones have, a small step in the plastic reduction challenge.

This version is made with dessicated coconut, maraschino cherries and sultanas. I usually wouldn’t buy maraschino cherries because of the colourings and additives, but in a moment of madness I bought some a while back to put in Christmas cake, which I subsequently didn’t make.

Many thanks to Hanan of the blog Sunshine Cooking, whose flapjack recipe I modified. I substituted margarine for butter, added extra oats, cut the amount of sugar, and subbed maple syrup for honey & golden syrup (golden syrup is traditionally used for flapjacks, but I didn’t have any). They were still really sweet, so next time I’ll cut the sugar further.

Coconut cherry flapjacks

1. Grease a 22cm (9″) square pan (I used a glass pan) with margarine, then cut a piece of baking paper to cover the base and two opposite sides. Grease the baking paper with margarine.

2. Preheat oven to 180C (350F).

3. In a mixing bowl, combine oats, sultanas, flour, sugar, cherries and coconut.

4. Stir maple syrup or golden syrup into melted margarine.

5. Pour margarine over oats and mix well.

6. Press mixture into prepared pan, pressing firmly. A potato masher works well.

7. Bake in preheated oven for 20 minutes, rotating pan halfway through.

8. Cool in pan before cutting into bars.

Makes 8 flapjacks.