Thursday, May 20, 2010

Seitan "Beef" Tips

Over two years ago, I developed a recipe for Seitan "Beef" Tips over Brown Rice for my cookbook. At the time, I'd just begun dabbling in developing recipes. The cookbook was just a baby idea then. I'd barely gotten started, and I wasn't even sure yet about my theme. I was just developing recipes all willy-nilly without a clear goal in mind. I just knew I wanted to publish a cookbook.

Some of those early recipes haven't made the cut. But this homestyle, hearty seitan entree is a keeper, for sure:

It's a veganized version of a beef tips recipe from one of my mom's old fundraiser cookbooks. You know the ones? Those spiral-bound volumes that benefit some Pentacostal church, Catholic school, or Junior League. Those homegrown volumes are so rich in delicious, comfort foods just begging to be veganized.

Anyhow, I made my Seitan "Beef" Tips again to test out the original recipe. And I served the filling entree with a side of sauteed, local rainbow Swiss chard with green garlic:

I picked up the chard from the GrowMemphis booth at the Cooper-Young Farmers Market last Saturday. GrowMemphis sells produce grown by inner-city kids in community gardens. To cook, I simply heated a little olive oil in a skillet, tossed in the chard stems and chopped green garlic, sauteed for about 7 minutes and added the leafy greens. After cooking for about 5 to 7 more minutes, I seasoned the greens with Bragg's, Asian chili-garlic sauce, and onion powder.

19 comments:

Sheridan said...

YUMMMMMMM! This looks so tasty! I want to try it!

Tami said...

What a great dinner!

Sarah @ See Sarah Eat said...

I haven't tried Seitan (other than primal strips) yet and this looks good! I also think GrowMemphis sounds like a really neat program :)

Unknown said...

Oh Yum!

dreaminitvegan said...

Beautiful swiss chard saute.

I haven't made much seitan because of my son's tummy issues. Yours looks so good.

Keri - I Eat Trees said...

Yum! I had forgotten all about my grandma's collection of those little spiral bound cookbooks!

The Voracious Vegan said...

I love those kinds of cookbooks. The Aramco American expat community has been making their own versions for decades and they are soooo amazing. It is like a walk through history flipping through the ones from the 40s and 50s, the recipes were CRAZY! And boy, they did not mess around with butter or cream or eggs back then. Those people's poor arteries!

This dish looks like a real winner, I can see why it made the cut to stay in your cookbook.

Anonymous said...

My grandma has TONS of those old church/junior league/etc cookbooks. I always love looking through them and laughing at some of the recipes (lard, coke, jell-o, and marshmallows appear in way too many of them, lol!) as well as finding gems I can't wait to veganize. It sounds and looks like you did a great job with this one!

Courtney

Pure2raw twins said...

I love chard!! The salad looks yummy!

Juliana said...

thanks for the visit :)
by the way, i'm a huge fan of john waters too :D

Jackie (Peaces of Earth) said...

I love rainbow chard so much. It looks beautiful!!

miss v said...

awesome.. will this be on your tester site soon? (wink wink) :)

Happy Older Hippie Woman! said...

...both the Lasagna & "Beef" Tips posts are absolutely making my stomach growl on-command! I haven't made lasagna in a while, and still need to be more creative with seitan, but soon, ...soon.
Hey, I found this & it looks like fun and a portal for inspiration:
http://foodblogsearch.com/

chow vegan said...

Looks yummy! and paired with swiss chard! That's one delicious meal! :-)

Misty said...

i love your blog! i'm a born and bred (bread!) memphis gal now living in dallas, and i love soul food! i love the idea of vegan soul style food. :) my husband is the only vegan in our family, but my sons and i are all lacto/ovo vegetarians. i miss memphis and just midtown in general!!! i'm so glad i saw your blog title on a friend's blog.. i'll be checking back often for your cookbook release!!
btw, do you make your own seitan or just buy prepackaged?

Trinity (of haiku tofu) said...

Yum yum yum!!!! I love old school comfort food like this. And that chard looks amazing.

the Greenling said...

Green garlic? Whatever is this strange and wonderful-sounding vegetable?

Erin said...

Looks delicious! I have one of those cookbooks from my parents church. The number of recipes that call for a "sleeve of Ritz crackers" as an ingredient is bewildering!

Eric said...

Ive been wanted to tell you how good the swiss chard looked but I usually read blogs at work and cant comment there! Anyways it looked amazing and I want to make some soon :)