Browned Stew with Dumplings
This is a warm and satisfying meal of a stew. This recipe works best when you don’t do anything to the seitan ahead of time (meaning, don’t boil it or bake it) so that it fries up really nice and gets crispy on the outside, yet stays chewy. Plus it will cook a little further once in the stew’s broth. These simple flour dumplings are reminiscent of lots of old homemade noodle recipes, which were often made with butter, flour, egg, water and salt, rolled flat and cut into squares and dropped in simmering broth. Grandma Marjorie used to put dumplings like this in her chicken noodle soup.
Makes 6 servings.
Ingredients
For the browned stew
4 ½ cups broth
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 small onion, diced
1 batch of seitan (see Basic Seitan), cut into 1-inch cubes
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 ½ teaspoons salt
⅛ teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon lemon juice (or just squeeze a couple lemon wedges all over the top just before serving)
For the dumplings
1 egg replacer egg (I like Bob Mill’s egg replacer)
1 cup flour
1 ½ teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
¾ cup unsweetened soy milk
Fresh parsley, chopped (optional)
Directions
Make the browned stew
In a small pot, bring broth to a boil.
In a separate pot or deep skillet (like a dutch oven, if you have one) cook diced onions and cubed seitan in olive oil on medium until brown.
Sprinkle flour, salt and pepper over the seitan and continue frying.
Add boiling broth right into the pot with seitan (you want it to be hot when it hits the seitan).
Bring the whole thing to a simmer, not a boil (boiling will break apart the dumplings).
Make the dumplings
Make egg replacer and set aside for a minute.
In a small mixing bowl, make dumpling batter by combining the flour, baking powder, and salt.
Add egg replacer and slowly add the soy milk and mix well. You should have a very light and fluffy batter. Err on the wet side.
Add pepper to taste. You can even add some fresh chopped parsley into the batter. The dough will be a bit sticky and that’s ok!
Drop tablespoon-sized pieces of dough into the simmering (not boiling!) stew until you’ve used up batter.
Reduce the heat to low and cook partially covered for another 15 minutes. The dumplings and the seitan will cook together all the way through.
Serve with a bit of fresh parsley and a squeeze of lemon on top.
