Seitan chicken

Ingredients

Ingredient	Quantity	Preparation	Alternatives	Notes
Garlic	1 bulb	Halved
Carrots	1 small	Diced
Celery	1 small stick	Diced
Miso paste	1 1/2 tbsp
Sugar	1 tsp
Vegetable stock powder	1 tbsp
Black pepper	1/2 tsp			Whole peppercorns is best
Silken tofu	75g
Cannellini beans	100g	Canned with the liquid
Vegetable oil	1 tbsp
Vital wheat gluten	100g
Salt
Rice vinegar	1/2 tsp		Apple cider vinegar or white wine vinegar

Other info

Timing: 5h 30min–overnight

Produces: 400g

Used in: Chicken nuggets

Variations

None

Instructions

1. Fill a large point with 1.5L of water and bring to the boil.
2. Reduce to a simmer, add 1/2 tsp of salt and add the broth ingredients. These are: the garlic, the carrot, the celery, 2/3 of the miso paste, the sugar, the peper, and half the stock powder. Cover with a lid.
3. While the broth simmers make the seitan. Place all the seitan ingredients except the vital wheat gluten in a blender. They are: the tofu, the cannellini beans, the remaining 1/3 of the miso paste, the vinegar, the remaining half of the stock powder, and the vegetable oil. Blend until as smooth as possible.
4. Add the vital wheat gluten to the blender (along with the other mixture) and blend again until smooth and very stretchy. Should be approx 2–5 minutes.
5. Remove the dough from the blender and leave to rest for 10 minutes.
6. Blend the mixture again for a final minute, and remove from the blender.
7. Knead the dough into a single smooth piece then divide into chunks. Leave the dough to rest for a further 10 minutes.
8. Working one chunk at a time, roll the dough into a long snake, then twist the ends in opposite directions until the dough feels taught, then tie the ends into two knots. Finally tightly wrap the ball in muslin.
9. Once all the chunks are ready, place them in the broth, cover again, and reduce the heat to the lowest setting.
10. Simmer for an hour, stirring occasionally.
11. Once cool transfer the whole mixture to the fridge to marinate. Leave for at least 4 hours, ideally overnight.