Seitan rejected my soul

I love a good piece of meat… fake, that is and fake meat rarely comes better than a chunky slab of seitan. Seitan is a meat substitute made of wheat gluten originating from China and it is particularly chewy. It is perfect for cooking with sauces and marinades as it sucks up liquid and flavours expertly.

I don’t see a lot of quality seitan in the UK so it was with immense delight that I watched Josh produce a jar of the good stuff from his grocery bag recently. Lima seitan is a quality wheat meat that is easy to carve and is barely flavoured, making it perfect to absorb any sauce you throw at it.

It doesn’t appear to be available in many stores but the Lima website does have a list of suppliers and retail outlets. It is apparently available in countries as far spread as the Czech Republic, Bahrain, Croatia, Spain, Israel, Slovenia and Iceland. Their availability reads like the Eurovision finalist list! We didn’t have to travel that far to nab our jar as Josh made his purchase in Alara Health Store located on Marchmont Street in Bloomsbury.

So what did I make with this wonder product?

I sliced our jar of Lima seitan into random chunks and added it to a fabulous spicy stew. This dish was a savoury overload featuring tomatoes, garlic, shoyu, potato and brown rice all flavoured with chipotle powder. The seitan was succulent, juicy and perfect.

Check out the photos below and please comment with your favourite seitan brands and recipes.

Lima Food seitan

Chunks of wheat meat

Slicing it up

Spicy chipotle & seitan stew