Which Came First: the Chicken or the Seitan?

Making a Great Chicken Substitute

Next time you watch someone eat a chicken breast, note how the meat shreds into bundles of fibers as they pull it apart. That's what I am seeking today.

I started with Faux Chicken from VeganGuineaPig's blog.  In my Cooking with Seitan cookbook, that author recommends using half soymilk, half water for the liquid mixed with the dry vital wheat gluten. I bought plain unsweetened soymilk and used about 1/2 soymilk, 2/2 water for this batch.

For some reason, I seem to need less liquid when making the gluten than most recipes call for. 

With the soymilk, the finished raw gluten seemed stickier than usual. I had to wet my hands to work it. Getting stuck gluten out of the mixing bowl is always a chore. I've found soaking the bowl helps. We try to keep the gluten out of the garbage disposal as I can't imagine it gets chewed up very well.

One recipe I read called for twisting and folding the gluten as you knead it to develop "muscle" layers.

Do this enough and you will develop new muscle layers.

I used plenty of sage. I got genuine Albanian sage from Penzey's. Their prices are remarkably good when compared to Spice Island and McCormick at the supermarkets. Who knew Albania is known for their sage? McCormick's website has an entire page on Albanian sage.

I cut the seitan dough into smaller pieces and then stretched out those pieces to make chick'n nuggets.

The pieces aren't that small; the bowl is huge

I started the seitan in ice water. Many recipes say that an icy cold start will produce a less rubbery seitan. I substituted 1 cup of ice for part of the water in the recipe and set the electric stove element to "3" to be sure I could catch it before it actually boiled.

I simmered it about an hour. As usual, it about doubled in size during the cook. When you first lift the lid, don't be surprised by the inflated seitan. It settles down to its resting size quickly.

Hope it tastes better than it looks

Another blog suggested that the seitan be allowed to cool in its broth, so that's what I did with this batch.So when is seitant done? Good question. There's no "warm and pink center" clues here. It's done when it looks and feels done. You've got to figure that out yourself.


This batch should be easy to prepare for a meal. Yes, you have to make the seitan and then prepare it for the table. Seitan right out of the pot or steamer isn't for the uninitiated.  I think I will bread and fry this batch. It's probably too healthy as is. 


The finished seitan has a good texture but has a bit more brainy exterior than I hoped.

Next I breaded it with bulk breadcrumbs from our local Whole Paycheck food store and pan-fried it in about 4 tablespoons of canola oil. I braised napa cabbage and sliced button mushrooms in the broth left over from the seitan. All in all, reasonably attractive and not too bad.

Pan-fried chick'n cutlets with braised napa cabbage and mushrooms

One caution: I didn't dry the seitan well enough before breading it. Must remember to blot surface water and squeeze out any interior water.


For the original recipe, look here. Substitute soymilk for 1/2 of the water used for mixing the vital wheat gluten. Knead by twisting and layering.


No question in my mind:  Braggs Liquid Aminos has a much more desirable taste than soy sauce. I was overjoyed to see how little sodium it contains as it has no added salt per label. But then I noticed the serving size is only 1/2 tsp. It actually has more sodium than my low sodium soy sauce.

Final grade:

Taste: B+

Texture: B

Appearance: C  (Still looks like seitan, not chicken)

Meat-like shredding: C-