MoFo Day Sixteen: Charlemagne and Seitan Sausages!

  Grumble, grumble, grumble...Oh, I probably shouldn't say this in case I alienate any Charlemagne-o-philes in my readership but we have just spent a VERY frustrating morning researching Charlemagne for a Home Ed history workshop all about him  which we are supposed to be attending tomorrow, and really just finding a load of material about war and battles, territory, 30 year military campaigns and politics and the odd fact, frequently mentioned, that he apparently had a very large neck... I did History at University so I do feel a bit shamefaced about finding it so bo-o-oring and feel that I have probably been very irresponsible and put my children off Charlemagne (whoever he was!) for life!
  Anyway, after literally HOURS of research we learned that he oversaw the move to a standardised script so that people could actually read each other's writing which was obviously quite a step forward although not one he benefited from as he was never completely literate.
  The other thing I found out was that he had between 18 and 20 children from five wives and four concubines- or four wives and five concubines, depending on which book you read and whether you count Himiltrude as a wife or a concubine. The only question still remains as to how to turn either of those pieces of information into an activity for tomorrow's Charlemagne workshop.. Ideas?
  So, today, because I have spent so much time researching Charlemagne I am going to have to write about something very simple: seitan sausages!
  We made these for the first time using a Joanne Stepaniak recipe from Vegan Vittles and I liked it but felt that it was really overcooked as, with no experience of my own on which to draw I had simply followed the instructions in the book.
   There are  recipes all over the internet for Seitan Sausages or Loaves; I'm not sure exactly where it originated, as some people said that it was originally from the Post Punk Kitchen, but a lot of the ingredients, including some slightly unusual ones are the same as in the recipe from Vegan Vittles so I don't know. I didn't follow a recipe because I already knew what I wanted to use for flavouring my seitan today. The basic recipe for making two sausages would be about 3 cups of gluten flour and 1.5 cups of water. You can flavour it how you want, and if you want advice as to how to make it taste more...you know..like....BEFORE..then you can check out Vegan Vittles or the Post Punk Kitchen for their ideas, because I'm not allowed to tell you!
  I can tell you what WE do anyway: we always put in a few tbsp of olive oil, 2-3 tbsp soy sauce, and 8-9 (several!) tbsp of tomato puree, 3 tbsp worcester sauce (make sure you get the vegan stuff if you want no fishes in your dishes!!), and we like about 1 tbsp of liquid smoke added. Add all the wet stuff to the other wet stuff- you'll see why later because once you've added the wet stuff to the dry stuff THERE IS NO GOING BACK!! It's no good standing pitifully beside your big gelatinous mound of seitan WISHING that you had put in your smoked paprika and your garlic- IT'LL BE TOO LATE!!

Gluten Flour: for vegans who miss chewy stuff!

  So, to 3 cups of DRY gluten flour, you can add 1 tsp paprika which gives it a warm earthy taste, about 3 tsp of smoked paprika, 2 tsp cayenne, 0.5 tsp cumin, 0.5 tsp mustard powder, 2 tsp salt and about 5 tsp garlic powder.
  This is how I make it because I like it to taste quite smokey and spicey. Some people put quite a lot of yeast flakes in their seitan sausages but I just choose not too because it always seems a bit profligate to me! I never think that it adds any taste in a recipe like this so I don't see the point in adding a fairly expensive ingredient that isn't really doing anything. It's possible tho' that some of the other things that people use such as cinnamon, all spice etc for flavour would be more detectable if it were a little less spicey- it's your seitan so you decide!!
  Now add the wet ingredients to the dry, mix and knead to make sure that it's all mixed well. Form into two sausages, a few inches long.and  wrap it up tightly in baking parchment, folding the ends up tightly and then lie the sausage on a baking sheet and cook at 170* for 55 minutes to an hour, turning over at least once, as the side underneath tends to get the hottest.
   Everyone else seems to cook it for a lot longer than me, not sure why. We do have quite a fierce oven but we had a different oven years ago when I first made seitan and it still seemed very overcooked and tough to me after 70, 80, or even 90 minutes in the oven. If you disagree, then it's fine (see how reasonable I am?), you can just check it at 55 minutes or an hour and cook for longer if you wish, but DO CHECK IT, OK?
   If you are just dipping your toe in the water about seitan then halve the quanitites above and just try making one sausage first. Aside from the cooking this recipe only takes about 5 minutes to prepare so it's very handy.
   You can eat it when it's still warm; it will firm up a little as it cools so give it a few minutes so it's easier to slice, or you can let it cool and then chill it in the fridge. It slices very well and is great in sandwiches, pitta bread, on pizzas, or you can chop it into chunks and add to stews and casseroles.
  We used to find gluten flour almost impossible to come by which is why we now sell it in our shop VegaNation, as we wanted to make sure that other vegans, country mice like us, could get hold of the amazing vegan products that rumour had it were being enjoyed by our sophisticated city cousins!! Enjoy!