Vegan MoFo: Sunday Seitan Roast with Red Wine (W is for Wine)

So the good news is, the Emperor is feeling mostly recovered. (Still running a fever off and on, but much lower, and his mood is much improved.) The bad news is that it looks like I'm next in line, and have also been doing the on again off again fever thing. I felt okayish this morning and luckily I started dinner then, or MoFo might not have happened tonight!

And that would be too sad, because this is our fourth and final boozy Sunday, when we visit one of my favorite things to just throw into things I'm cooking: wine!



As you may know if you've been reading along this month, I have fallen desperately in love with the Savory Seitan from American Vegan Kitchen. Really, I think that recipe alone is worth the price of the cookbook (and there are so many other tasty things in there too!), or at least it has been for me. I've made it something like four times this month, doing the frying/oven braising cutlet method every time. This time I decided to try the crockpot method instead and while I was already pulling out the crockpot... why not throw some vegetables in there?



Sunday seitan roast with red wine
1/2 recipe of American Vegan Kitchen's Savory Seitan, shaped into two separate roasts -- or your favorite seitan roast, uncooked
1 bottle red wine (we really used about 3/4s of an old bottle of not great wine, and a 1/4 bottle of a new okay bottle)
1 large parsnip, cubed
5 stalks of celery, chopped
1 large onion, peeled & quartered
6 small potatoes, halved
fresh or dried herbs of your choosing: I used leftover fresh rosemary and about 2 tsps each dried oregano and thyme
4 small dried shiitake mushrooms
2-4c additional veggie broth

Optional gravy:
1 tbsp EB
2 tbsps cornstarch
1/4c water

1. Put all of the ingredients in the first list except broth (seitan, wine, parsnip, celery, onion, potatoes, herbs, mushrooms) in a 5 qt crock pot.
2. Add veggie broth until everything is covered. I needed a little more than 2 c of broth.
3. Cook on low for 8 hours.

4. To make gravy: remove 2c of cooking liquid once the roast is cooked and put it in a small sauce pan.
5. Add the earth balance.
6. Heat over medium heat.
7. While heating, whisk cornstarch into water.
8. Then whisk slurry into mixture in saucepan.
9. Bring to a boil and let boil for at least 1 minute to thicken/cook cornstarch.

I sliced the roast and put a bit of gravy on it, then served the cooked vegetables alongside it and a couple of pieces of EB'd bread.



Josh and I thought it was really yummy. The seitan somehow manages to be simultaneously soft and yet not mushy, the way that undercooked seitan sometimes turns out. The gravy's a nice addition too, but what's not better with gravy? I would have really liked a green vegetable alongside this but really people, I'm in no condition to even pull a bag of broccoli out of the freezer.

The Emperor was anti-seitan today for whatever reason. He just ate his bread. Oh well.

Earlier a firetruck got stuck outside of our house. Here is the Emperor looking VERY concerned about the situation:



Until tomorrow!