This vegan salami is made out of seitan, and is perfect for sandwiches or pizza! Similar to the pepperoni recipe, but this has a few different spices, is less dense and is cooked for less time to keep its juiciness. Don't buy the expensive pre-packaged seitan—just make your own for a fraction of the price! This recipe uses tapioca starch to mimic the fatty bits slightly, although it's more of a jelly that aids in holding it together. Use 180ml water instead of 140ml if you choose not to use the tapioca (it's just as good without it).
Prep Time
10mins
Cook Time
1hour
Prep Time
10mins
Cook Time
1hour
Vegan Salami
Print Recipe
This vegan salami is made out of seitan, and is perfect for sandwiches or pizza! Similar to the pepperoni recipe, but this has a few different spices, is less dense and is cooked for less time to keep its juiciness. Don't buy the expensive pre-packaged seitan—just make your own for a fraction of the price! This recipe uses tapioca starch to mimic the fatty bits slightly, although it's more of a jelly that aids in holding it together. Use 180ml water instead of 140ml if you choose not to use the tapioca (it's just as good without it).
Add the tapioca starch into a bowl and pour in the boiling water. Mix well with a spoon until it becomes a gooey paste. Set aside while you prepare the rest.
The Rest
Add all the dry ingredients into a bowl and mix together with a fork. Add the wet ingredients including the tapioca, and half of the water. Mix well with your hands and slowly add the rest of the water. If it becomes too sticky, add some more vital wheat gluten. Knead for 2-3 minutes and roll out into a thick sausage shape.
Wrap tightly in foil.
Bake for 1 hour in a pre-heated oven at 220°C. Let it cool completely before taking it out of the foil to keep the moisture in (~2-3 hours).
Cook the macaroni as per the package instructions in a medium-large saucepan—usually 10-12 minutes for slightly underdone (al dente), because you'll be heating it further with the cheese in a minute!
combine the soaked and drained cashews, almond milk, nutritional yeast, lemon juice, garlic, smoked paprika, turmeric & salt and pepper in a high speed blender until thick and creamy.
Drain the pasta and add with the sauce back into the pot. Stir well and heat for another 2-3 minutes.
Serve with vegan crispy bacon bits or fried panko breadcrumbs and a few spring onion slices. Amazing!
Buffalo anything is my favourite, and it must always only be made with Frank's Original. These crispy fried cauliflower pieces are amazing with some garlic dip, and easy to make!
Buffalo anything is my favourite, and it must always only be made with Frank's Original. These crispy fried cauliflower pieces are amazing with some garlic dip, and easy to make!
Add the flour, nutritional yeast, salt, pepper, smoked paprika, garlic powder and oregano to a bowl and mix well with a whisk. Slowly mix in the water until smooth.
Buffalo Sauce
In a glass jug empty the bottle of Frank's and add 2 Tbsp of dairy-free spread. Heat in the microwave for about 2 minutes, stirring occasionally.
Garlic Dip
Mix 2 Tbsp of vegan mayo with the chopped garlic, parsley, cider vinegar and salt & pepper and mix well.
Cauliflower
Heat about 200ml oil in a deep pan.
Cut the cauliflower into florets. I cut mine into about 12 pieces this time, getting rid of the thick trunk bit. Cut smaller for bite-sized pieces.
Dip the cauliflower into the batter and gently place in the hot oil for 2-3 minutes, turning every minute until golden and crispy.
In a large bowl, pour the Frank's over the hot cauliflower pieces and mix it up well. Remove them from the bowl so they stay crispy. Serve on gem lettuce leaves with celery sticks and garlic dip.
A ridiculously tasty vegan version of the popular Chinese takeaway favourite: Crispy Chilli Beef!
After accidentally creating some sort of crispy beef/steak out of seitan one day, I refined it to closely resemble the look, taste and texture of the real thing before deciding it would be perfect for a vegan 'crispy chilli beef' recipe. I was not disappointed! It takes a bit of prep work, but once you've tried it you'll realise it was time well spent.
A ridiculously tasty vegan version of the popular Chinese takeaway favourite: Crispy Chilli Beef!
After accidentally creating some sort of crispy beef/steak out of seitan one day, I refined it to closely resemble the look, taste and texture of the real thing before deciding it would be perfect for a vegan 'crispy chilli beef' recipe. I was not disappointed! It takes a bit of prep work, but once you've tried it you'll realise it was time well spent.
In a large bowl, add the vital wheat gluten, nutritional yeast, garlic powder, smoked paprika, bouillon powder and beetroot powder and mix well with a fork. Add the dark soy sauce, liquid smoke and 60ml water and mix well. Form into a dough, set aside the bowl and knead on a clean surface for 2-3 minutes. This will toughen up the gluten slightly. If you use too much water, just add a bit more gluten.
Stretch out the dough so it's long and thin; it will have some resistance, but keep at it and apply pressure with your hands and it will stay put.
Slice the seitan into long, thin strips. It doubles in size when cooking so the thinner you slice it, the better. More surface area means more sauce coverage!
In the bowl you set aside, add the cornflour and Chinese five spice and mix well with a fork. Coat each piece of seitan with the mixture.
In a large wok, heat approx. 6 tbsp vegetable oil until hot. Fry the pieces of seitan for about 10 minutes or until browned and crispy. Set aside.
(while it's cooking, chop the veggies so you're not hanging around)
Veggies
Thinly slice the red pepper and chilli (with seeds). Slice the spring onions and separate the lighter parts from the green. Mince or slice the garlic into small pieces and slice the ginger into matchsticks.
Set aside half the chilli and the green parts of the spring onions.
Fry the ginger, garlic, red pepper, half the chilli and white parts of the spring onions for a 2-3 minutes on a medium heat until soft. Try not to burn the garlic and ginger or they'll go bitter.
Sauce
While the veg is cooking, grab a jug (or bowl) and add the vinegar, light soy sauce, sweet chilli sauce, ketchup and 2 tbsp water. Mix well and add to the wok. Turn up the heat and let it bubble for a minute or two. Add the seitan and ensure the pieces are coated evenly in sauce. Heat for another minute.
Serve on noodles or rice, and sprinkle the green bits of spring onions and remaining chilli on top. Enjoy hot!
Recipe Notes
The seitan could easily be used in any recipe that calls for beef—Chinese or otherwise. You could also make larger quantities of the seitan dough and freeze it for later to save you making it from scratch every time. Also, you can freeze any leftover cornflour/five spice mixture in a bag if you use too much; although it's cheap there's no need to waste anything!
The demand for vegan junk food is on the rise, and for good reason! You may have experienced weirdly-similar mock chicken products available in vegan fast food joints all around the UK and wonder how the hell they do it. The answer is seitan! With this recipe you will learn how to prepare your own fried chicken-style bites, wings, burgers, or whatever else you want to shape it into.
Don't be put off by the ingredients list—it's worth it! Besides, most are basic ingredients that you should have in your cupboard anyway.
The demand for vegan junk food is on the rise, and for good reason! You may have experienced weirdly-similar mock chicken products available in vegan fast food joints all around the UK and wonder how the hell they do it. The answer is seitan! With this recipe you will learn how to prepare your own fried chicken-style bites, wings, burgers, or whatever else you want to shape it into.
Don't be put off by the ingredients list—it's worth it! Besides, most are basic ingredients that you should have in your cupboard anyway.
1tspred chilli flakesI like mine a bit spicy, so I use red chilli flakes but you could use ordinary chilli powder instead.
Servings: people
Instructions
Broth
Start by boiling the kettle and placing all the ingredients for the broth into a large saucepan. It needs to be large!
Bring the mixture to a boil and reduce to a simmer (just below boiling point, bubbling very slightly). Cover.
Seitan
Into a large mixing bowl add the vital wheat gluten, nutritional yeast, garlic powder, smoked paprika, bouillon and oregano. Mix with a whisk or fork.
Add the soy sauce and liquid smoke, and add the water in a little bit at a time. Use your hands to form a rough dough. Be careful not to use too much water, but if you do just add a bit more gluten.
Knead the dough just a little bit until the ingredients are mixed together evenly - about 2-3 minutes. THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT! Don't overwork it—it only need kneading a little bit else it will go tough. The more you knead the tougher it will get, which is perfect for making seitan steak or beef-style burgers.
With your dough in hand over the broth, rip it up into small pieces and drop them in. You should be able to rip off about 16 pieces. Don't worry if they seem a bit small... they will swell to double the size in the broth! Leave to simmer for 30 minutes.
Crispy Coating
While the seitan is cooking in the broth, prepare your coating. Add the flour, garlic powder, smoked paprika, salt, cumin and chilli flakes to another bowl (you could use the same bowl you mixed the seitan dough in to save washing up!). Mix with a whisk or fork.
After 30 minutes the seitan will be done, so turn out the heat. Ideally you want to wait for it to cool in the broth before coating the pieces with the flour mixture, but that seems like a lot of waiting around, so take the lid off and go do something for 20 minutes or until you can handle the seitan pieces with your hands.
Heat a large wok or frying pan with about 250ml oil (a lot I know, but as long as it's hot enough it shouldn't absorb too much into the seitan).
Gently squeeze each piece of seitan over the sink or broth before pressing them into the flour mixture and set aside. Don't squeeze too hard.. you want some moisture to stay in there so it stays succulent!
With the pan really hot, fry the pieces in the oil for a couple minutes each side until golden brown. I did this in batches which took about 10 minutes because I have a small wok.
Note: upon putting the pieces in the pan, it's supposed to be quite violent. If it's not hot enough it will sit there slowly bubbling away, absorbing all that oil. Gross!
Either serve as-is, or do what I did and dip the pieces into buffalo sauce (Frank's & melted dairy-free spread) before flashing on a hot BBQ. Enjoy!
Recipe Notes
You could use BBQ sauce instead of buffalo to make BBQ chicken if you'd prefer. I find that the texture is almost like boneless chicken thigh, it's pretty amazing! Be careful not to overheat it, because it can go quite tough if left on the BBQ for too long.
I love these because they're so quick to make. You can pretty much use anything you want for this recipe; carrots, sweetcorn, onion, chilli, different herbs and spices.
You can get "nut cutlets" in Aldi which is where I got the inspiration from. Those are very nice and pretty cheap! This recipe is cheaper though.
I love these because they're so quick to make. You can pretty much use anything you want for this recipe; carrots, sweetcorn, onion, chilli, different herbs and spices.
You can get "nut cutlets" in Aldi which is where I got the inspiration from. Those are very nice and pretty cheap! This recipe is cheaper though.
Dry-fry the onion in a large saucepan on medium-high for around 3 minutes until slightly brown. Add 1 tbsp water at a time if it starts to stick.
Add the garlic and fry for a further 2 minutes.
Add the chopped tomatoes and bring to the boil. Add spices at this stage if you want to.
Reduce heat and add the soya mince, lentils and salt. Add a splash of water and mix thoroughly before simmering for 20 minutes with the lid on. Try not to let it stick to the pan!
While the mince is simmering, cook and drain the pasta. Save some of the starchy liquid to add to your mince if it gets too thick.
Add the basil to the mixture and taste to see if you need to add more salt or spices. I add black pepper and a handful of kale at this point. Put the lid on and cook for a further 1-2 minutes until the kale has cooked.
Serve and sprinkle some nutritional yeast over the top like you would Parmesan cheese.
Recipe Notes
These are great to chill or freeze if you want to make them in batches. Cook straight from frozen under the grill or bake for about 20 minutes on 200°C.
