Vegan Chik'n

This meat-free loaf definitely tastes a lot like chicken, but the best part is it's completely animal free. I have experimented with several seitan recipes over the years, as seitan is a very meat-like vegan protein (and by protein-- it has a TON of protein in it!) and has the realistic dense texture of meat unlike some other other faux-meat recipes that are good but taste more like veggies than "meat". This being said- I'm not a meat eater and I hate meat, but I think having a similar texture or familiarity to traditional meat is important for people that do want something meaty and are looking to find a plant-based substitute they can relate to and enjoy. One thing I generally am not crazy about when it comes to typical seitan is the really dense and heaviness of it from all the wheat gluten, so I've been trying to find an alternative that's lighter and more tender but isn't gross or too spongy. So far, this recipe is the best I've made and it really tastes like a super tender chicken breast and has the versatility to do just about anything with it as you would with real chicken.

I got the original recipe from Full of Plants, and love the creativity of combining tofu and jackfruit along with vital wheat gluten to create the absolute perfect tender texture with some extra fiber in there too. The original recipe sounded great but very bland - as the author admitted the recipe would need to be marinated to have a good flavor. That's fine, but I personally prefer my vegan recipes to taste good on their own, so that you have the option to enhance them with other preparations or even just eat it just as it is. I modified the ratios and added some marinara, nutritional yeast, and garlic into the "dough" so that after being cooked it tasted delicious even when left plain! This version below is my spin-off and I think I nailed it! I hope you enjoy it too! It is not gluten-free as the wheat gluten is essential to give it the fibrous "meaty" texture and elasticity to hold the dough together.

Ingredients:

1 block of firm tofu (14 oz), drained of water
1 20 oz can of young green jackfruit, drained of brine
2/3 cup marinara sauce
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tsp salt
1-2 tsp onion powder
1-2 tsp garlic powder
1 and 1/4-1/2 cup vital wheat gluten
2 tbsp all purpose flour (or any type of alternative flour is fine!)
1/4 - 1/3 cup nutritional yeast

In a food processor, blend together the tofu and jackfruit until as smooth as possible. Add the marinara sauce, oil, salt, onion powder and garlic powder and blend together until well combined.

Add the wheat gluten, flour and nutritional yeast and continue to blend for a few minutes. The dough should be moist and very slightly sticky to the touch but not too sticky. If too sticky, add more flour (if you need a LOT more, add the wheat gluten if you just need a little you can add the all purpose flour). If the mixture is too dry, add more marinara sauce until the perfect consistency is reached.

With a food processor on a dough-like setting, or in an electric mixer, let the batter continue to mix for 10-15 minutes. This excessive kneading will get you the perfect texture for "chik'n".

Separate the mixture into 3 equal parts. Roll each into a "log" and double wrap tightly in aluminum foil so it's entirely covered really well (you'll be cooking by submerging this into water). I achieved a perfect consistency by cooking mine in a pressure cooker for about 40 minutes. Add the aluminum covered "logs" into a pressure cooker pot with water up to the maximum fill line and manually input the time for 40 minutes. If you don't have a pressure cooker, you should be able to cook on a stove top in boiling water for 40ish minutes (but unwrapping a piece and checking consistency to see if it needs to cook longer). The "log" of meat should be very tender and soft but thoroughly cooked all the way through and not sticky or doughy in the middle.



Allow your chik'n pieces to cool and they can be eaten right away. You can slice them for sandwiches, shred/tear apart with your fingers to get a stringy chicken-like texture, cut into small chunks... however you need it. The original recipe recommends refrigerating for 2 hours before eating, and this may be a texture thing but I loved the really soft tender texture with it right when it cooled without refrigerating. I love that this is not really chewy like regular seitan, it's very soft and easy to eat but still tastes really similar to meat (without any animals harmed!). I enjoyed ours baked with some marinara sauce and vegan mozzerella cheese shreds until the cheese was throughly melted for a simple parmesan, but if you prefer a breaded version try this one (it's AMAZING!). You can bake it, saute it, marinate it, make a chik'n salad, make a curry.. coat it with a tasty Thai peanut sauce.. whatever you would do with pre-cooked chik'n. Enjoy!