Homemade vegan beef
The recipe and ways to use it
I’ve made quite a lot of seitan in my day, using both the washed flour method and vital wheat gluten (if you got here without reading the introductory screed first, there’s more info there). But these days, this simple beef-like thing is the type of seitan I make most often. I usually use it in place of beef in whatever cozy stew recipe I feel like making, or sometimes I’ll fry up a whole “steak” and serve it with vegetables and potatoes (see below for examples). It’s chewy, and flavourful, and yeah, it’s meaty, and I just really like it.
If you ever want to go the distance and wash your own flour from scratch, this is my all-time favourite tutorial for doing so. It gives me excellent results. You can throw your resulting gluten in the foot processor with dry-ish seasonings to make it beefy, or just simmer it gently in a similar stock to the one in my recipe. Just don’t add vinegar if you go this route, vinegar and home-washed gluten make an irreparable mess (science!) If you want to know more about that, ask me anytime!
The vital wheat gluten route is far easier and less messy. You can make the dough for this beef in seven minutes or less, and then it just needs to rest, fry, and then simmer for an hour. I will typically make a batch on a Sunday afternoon (not every Sunday!), use some of it for dinner that night, and then freeze the rest. Then a nice stew or steak is just a defrost away.
I want to make a huge disclaimer about vital wheat gluten (VWG) here: it is possible to get a bad batch and become convinced that you hate the stuff across the board. Unfortunately, I think it can go stale pretty easily if not kept in the fridge, and then your seitan ends up tasting like play dough or worse, and it’s just so sad. If you open up your bag of VWG, it will likely smell a bit gross, and that’s okay. But if it smells truly disgusting, rancid, super-strong, etc. I’m so sorry but throw it out and try again. I have used Bob’s Red Mill, Anthony’s, and Bulk Barn VWG (at Bulk Barn it’s labeled “gluten flour” I believe) to great effect, but I have, on occasion, encountered bad batches of all of them. These days, I find Bulk Barn to be pretty reliable. I buy a bunch and store it either in the fridge or freezer.
Another disclaimer: seitan will always taste a bit bread-y. It won’t taste exactly like meat. But if you’re finding it doesn’t even remind you of meat at all, boost your seasonings! Seitan can take a lot. Also add a little acid — vinegar, wine, and sauerkraut brine all help cut the bread-y taste. For my taste, the recipe below yields a decently flavourful seitan, but I’m planning to use it in a stew that will impart more flavour. If I just fry it up as a steak, I will salt and pepper it, and baste it in a bit of its simmering broth as I fry it as well.
This recipe is a riff on my friend Aleksandra Feodorovna’s filet mignon recipe, which lives in the Files at The Seitan Appreciation Society on Facebook. I’ve made changes to suit my taste over the years, but two genius moves from the original recipe remain: using coffee for beefy flavour, and using soy milk as the liquid. These are just excellent ideas and Aleksandra is a true seitan artist. While there are lots of “shreddy,” almost stringy versions of beefy seitan out there, these involve extensive machine kneading (or really thorough flour washing), and I prefer this recipe’s simple process and tender product.
Homemade Vegan Beef
Simple Beefy Seasoning (optional but recommended):
40 g (about ten) dried shiitake mushrooms (you could sub any dried mushroom you enjoy, or store-bought mushroom powder)
1 tbsp onion powder
1 tbsp garlic powder
1 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
Salt and pepper to taste
Stock:
8 cups water
1/2 cup soy sauce (I use Chinese dark soy sauce for colour, typically Pearl River Bridge brand; other soy sauce may be saltier)
2-3 tbsp of Simple Beefy Seasoning (use a commercial vegan beef bouillon if you prefer. I have heard Better than Bouillon’s No Beef flavour is good.)
2 tbsp olive oil
4 garlic cloves or a big dash dried
Lots of ground black pepper (or a few black peppercorns)
Feel free to add other vegetables and scraps you might normally put into stock — onions, carrots, celery, ginger, bay leaves, etc. I just keep mine super-simple because it’s typically going to be used in a stew with aromatics later on.
Steaks:
4 tbsp Simple Beefy Seasoning (use a commercial vegan beef bouillon if you prefer. I have heard Better than Bouillon’s No Beef flavour is good.)
1 tbsp miso (I usually use red, but any miso is fine)
1 tbsp soy sauce (I use Chinese dark soy sauce for colour, typically Pearl River Bridge brand; other soy sauce may be saltier)
½ cup brewed coffee, room temp or warm (cold is fine, too)
11/2 cups soy milk
1 tbsp Chinese black vinegar (I think the black vinegar is nice in beefy things, but feel free to sub red wine vinegar, or even balsamic)
450 g vital wheat gluten (about 3 cups)
2-3 tbsp olive oil (or oil of your choice)
Method:
To make the Simple Beefy Seasoning, powder the shiitakes using a blender, spice mill, or food processor (there’s lots of powdered mushroom products out there these days, too, that you can totally use, they just might be more expensive). Stir in the other ingredients. This will make more seasoning than you need for the recipe, but just use it to make more! Or sprinkle it on…everything!
Put all the stock ingredients in a large pot and bring to a simmer over medium high heat. Turn down to medium low, cover, and let that hang out while you make the seitan.
Combine Simple Beefy Seasoning and all wet ingredients except for oil in a medium bowl, whisking with a fork until the miso is dissolved.
Add vital wheat gluten to a large bowl, make a well in the centre, and pour in the mixed wet ingredients. Stir with a spatula or wooden spoon until no dry spots remain. You can lightly knead with clean hands to achieve this, but if you knead it hard, it’ll strengthen the gluten more and your seitan could get tough or rubbery.
Cover and let the dough rest for 5-10 minutes so the gluten can relax a bit. Once rested, cut the dough in half, shape each half into a sort of cylindrical loaf, and slice into six “steaks” about 3/4 inch thick. You can kind of stretch and shape them once sliced to be a bit steak-like if you like.
Heat two tablespoons of oil in a skillet over medium (I like cast iron for this). Fry the steaks (you’ll likely need to do two batches) about 2-3 minutes per side until browned. Add a little more oil as needed. This step doesn’t cook the seitan, but it creates flavour and seals the shape a bit so they don’t puff out as wildly while simmering. When browned, move the steaks into the simmering stock (you can put your first batch in the stock already while the second batch fries, it’s no problem).
VERY IMPORTANT SEITAN INTEL: Simmer the seitan for one hour at a VERY LOW SIMMER. I have my best luck with this by using a big pot on a little burner. Some people use an Instant Pot, some people just watch it like a hawk. But if the stock boils, your seitan will really blow up and get spongy. Honestly, I still think it tastes great that way. For years I had no clue what I was doing and happily ate spongy seitan, and this is the desired texture in many Chinese dishes. But if it’s steak-y, stew-y, beef-like seitan you’re after, don’t let it boil, just simmer lightly. “Poach” one might say. Check on the beef periodically, turn it over, make sure it’s fairly submerged at all times. Add a little more water if the broth has reduced a lot. It can be annoying, but it’s only an hour of your life, so babysit it a bit.
You can now use the seitan and stock right away. I usually pull out a few steaks and let them cool enough to handle and make a stew with them the same day. You can also let them cool some in the pot and then pop the whole lot in the fridge to deal with later. Seitan firms quite a bit after cooling, but in this recipe I don’t find the difference that stark. I use both the seitan and stock in my stews, substituting my stock for water in recipes where the beef is slow cooked. I freeze any leftover steaks with some stock, usually in 3-4 steak portions, for up to six months (or longer tbh). If any of this is confusing, let me know!
How to serve
Here are some of the stews I’ve recently made to get you started. You can really use this anywhere a recipe calls for any kind of stewing beef or steak or things like that. In general, as above, sub your seitan stock for water. You can typically also cook your stew for much less time because your “beef” is already cooked. So just go until your vegetables are cooked and everything tastes to your liking.
This is stifado, a glorious Greek stew my mom used to make when I was little and that I hadn’t had in a long time until this past December. The whole shallots or onions in there are really special. I used this recipe (skipped the brandy, used shallots instead of pearl onions, my seitan stock instead of water, and seitan instead of the beef, obv.)
I got excited about making Vietnamese Bò Kho when I saw the recipe in
’s epic vol-au-vent post. I largely followed that recipe, but cut down the wine a little, subbed a little of my vegan anchovy paste for fish sauce, and used cilantro instead of basil because that’s what I had. I read a lot about Bò Kho and totally cried watching this beautiful History Channel video about it, starring who is so great.
Here’s another childhood fave, Hungarian Goulash. I used this recipe, but bastardized it thoroughly by not using Hungarian paprika as instructed (I used a mix of smoked and “grocery store regular”), and subbed the bell peppers with half a jar of ajvar (Balkan red pepper/eggplant spread) I had in the fridge that I wanted to use up. Total blasphemy, but you know what? It tasted amazing! ✌️
And finally, here she is as steak. I haven’t made my seitan like this in a minute, so all I could find was this old pic with a bite already out of it, sorry about that. Anyway, when I make it like this, I usually season with plenty of salt and pepper, and then fry in olive oil with a couple of garlic cloves in the pan as well (very Gordan Ramsay). Then I’ll add some vegan butter at the last minute if I have, or if not a teeny bit of vegan yogurt and more oil (it works!) and let it sizzle some more, then baste with a little bit of the stock, and maybe repeat that again till it looks nice and lacquered and also juicy.
LOOOOVE home made seitan. Have always used a book for the recipes. Going to try out your version ASAP!!!!