Meatless Most Days (Seitan Stir-fry)

First entry after five (!!!) years - I've been busy with...stuff (i.e., "accidental" government work!). I'd even forgotten I had this blog. But anyway.

It's been meatless most days in our omnivorous household recently, mainly for health reasons. But it's really no biggie, as I secretly enjoy the texture and versatility of tofu, seitan, and "Magic Meat," and I'm up to the challenge of cooking up as many dishes as I can sans meat.

Good thing that Manila is beginning to embrace the vegetarian/vegan lifestyle, so it's relatively easy to find places that sell cooked vegetarian meals and meat substitutes. I found seitan (gluten) in the frozen section of Assad Indian Mini Mart (branches in Timog, Quezon City; Jupiter in Makati; and U.N. Avenue in Paco, Manila); they also sell frozen and canned Ve-G-Meat. Here's my first experiment cooking seitan, and it turned out pretty good. It probably would have turned out better with snow peas, but I couldn't find any in the supermarket today, except for an organic pack of malnourished snow peas that cost more than I was willing to pay:

Seitan Stir-Fry

250 g seitan, cut into strips
1 tbsp. corn or potato starch
4 tbsp. light soy sauce
1 medium onion, sliced
4 cloves garlic, crushed
1 medium carrot, sliced
200 g. squid balls, cut in halves
1/4 c. water chestnuts, sliced
200 g. young corn, sliced
3 tbsp. oyster sauce
1/4 c. water
pepper to taste
1 tbsp. canola oil

Marinate the seitan strips in cornstarch and 2 tbsp. of soy sauce; set aside for a few minutes. In a separate bowl, mix the remaining soy sauce, oyster sauce, sugar, and pepper. Heat the oil and saute the onion and garlic; add in the carrot, young corn, water chestnuts, squid balls, and oyster sauce mixture. Let cook at high heat for a few minutes (vegetables should still be firm, not mushy), then add in the seitan mixture. Cook for a couple more minutes, and serve hot.

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