Make Seitan Yourself – That’s How it Works

Seitan is on every vegetarian and vegan menu and you can easily make the food yourself. To make seitan yourself, you have the option of using purchased gluten flour or making the gluten flour yourself.

How to make seitan yourself

Seitan is made from wheat gluten. You can get gluten flour from specialist retailers.

• To make seitan, first, knead dough from gluten flour and liquid.
• Seitan needs to be seasoned well so it doesn’t taste like flour later. Therefore, you can also mix the gluten flour with a well-seasoned vegetable broth. Alternatively, you can use water for the production of the meat substitute and add more seasoning later.
• 80 to 100 milliliters of water or vegetable broth are added to 100 grams of gluten flour. Knead a firm dough from the gluten flour and the liquid.
• Then chop up the dough and add it to a seasoned broth. Let the dough cook for about 30 minutes. While the dough is in the broth, it absorbs most of the seasoning. Therefore, you should season the brew properly to your taste.
• If you want to keep the seitan in the fridge for a few days, it is best to put it in a delicious marinade. The seitan will keep in the fridge for about four to five days.
• If you have made a larger amount of seitan, you can also freeze the vegan food for a few weeks. Seitan can be stored in the freezer for up to ten weeks.
• Tip: If you want the seitan to be particularly firm, cut the dough into slices. Distribute the dough slices in boil-proof foil bags. Then squeeze the air out of the bags and seal them tightly. Boil the dough in the foil bags in water for about two hours.

Make your gluten flour for seitan

If you have the ambition to also make the gluten flour for the seitan yourself, you will need a little more time and patience.

• First, form a firm dough from wheat flour and water. You can use very simple flour for this, as all the nutrients will be washed out anyway. In this case, buying more expensive wholemeal flour would be a complete waste of money.
• Then put the dough in a bowl and cover it with water. Let the dough rest for one to two hours.
• As soon as the water has taken on milky cloudiness, start kneading the dough in the water.
• After a while, change the water and continue kneading. You can take a break in between and let the dough rest in the water for a few minutes.
• Periodically swap out the water containing the dissolved starch for fresh water.
• When the water is no longer cloudy and the dough feels rubbery, the gluten flour is ready.