Thursday, March 12, 2009

Seitan, you dissapoint me.


Okay, so I made seitan again... this time I used the recipe for Breakfast Sausages.
See, I had this idea to use my clay pot to make some potatoes and I wanted to try sort of steaming my 'log' of seitan in there as I do not have a steamer and I thought this might be a nice alternative. If you are not aware, steaming your seitan is the new phenomenon. First it was baking, now it's steaming. Now I declare it's clay potting... it's like baking AND steaming! No, actually, I got the idea from Bryanna.

I made it pretty much as the recipe called for, tossed my potatoes with 1 T olive oil and rock salt right there in the clay pot, wrapped up the seitan in tinfoil, set it on top and BAM! there was supper. No, actually, I poured in 1/2 C beer, put it into a cold oven turned to 400 degrees and waited 1 hour and then BAM! had supper. Next time I would add more salt to the seitan dough. I was hoping for a markedly different texture using the clay pot cooker, but no such luck. I am always slightly disappointed with seitan. Seitan, you disappoint me.

Here is some red lentil soup and Moroccan bread. Can't find the link, it was a pdf...

The bread I baked on parchment paper on my pizza stone and it came out pretty crispy, not exactly what I was imagining (I was imagining a wonderful bread from a local restaurant Babani's- we actually had them cater our wedding and one sharp memory I still retain is of the waiters/caterers bringing out these large round loaves carried on their shoulders- sooo goood!).

Well anyway, it was still good, just not what I was expecting. Perhaps next time I will bake it on a baking sheet and for less time?

2 1/2 C semolina flour (I subbed in 1 C AP flour)
1 scant T yeast dissolved in 1/4 C warm water
1 C warm water

toppings;
1 T olive oil
1 T kosher salt
1 T sesame seeds

Mix the dry and wet. Knead until smooth. Let rest 15m then flatten into a 3/4" round on parchment paper.
Cover with an inverted bowl and let rise 1 hour or until doubled.
20m before rising time is over, preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Bake 35-40m.

Still working through "Embrace Me"- kinda dragging right now, but that may be because my brain feels like cotton balls right now. Or is that bowling balls?

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow Elizabeth, impressive, you are a BUSY woman!! So when do we come for dinner?? ~Randi

For the Love of Guava said...

mm.. seitan always disappoints me too... although I still haven't really tried to make it at home...just doesn't seem worth the work if I'm not going to want to eat it... that bread however I will have a slice of... thanks **raranomrarnom** (sound of stuffing bread into mouth)

Happy Friday!

The River Otter said...

I love your new blog layout!

elizabeth said...

Thanks Randi for the bloggy love!!

gg- oh, seitan and then we had 'mock duck' when we went out and I'm like "How do they do this?!?"... glad I'm not the only one baffled...

thx river otter!! It's from Dan, you know!