Seitan Sunday: Corned Beef Seitan

Growing up, my cousin Gemma was the closest thing I had to a sister and we used to spend most weekends at each others houses.

When we were at her house, the evenings always used to consisted of a tea of baked beans on toast (I was a fussy eater and that was one of the few things I'd eat) and watching Noel's House Party before heading over to her Grandparent's house, which involved watching Gladiators and Challenge Anneka.

Sometimes as a snack her Grandma used to give us a slice of corned beef (just corned beef, never on a sandwich), and corned beef always reminded me of happy childhood memories.

For my first Seitan Sunday, I decided to make corned beef using this recipe.

I couldn't find any ready ground mustard or cloves, so I ground mustard seeds and whole cloves in a pestle and mortar which took a while. Apart from that, once I'd gathered together all the ingredients it didn't take too long. I did nearly forget to add in the oil, but remembered just as I was shaping it to go in the oven, so I put it back into the mixing bowl, added in the oil, mixed, gave it another quick knead and re-shaped it.  Then it was just a matter of cooking it.

After it was cooked, I took it out of the foil to cool down on the side before popping into the fridge for an hour. Then, once cooled I sliced some up to make a sandwich.

The inside kind of looks like a darker version of the corned beef of my childhood.

I was planning on having a reuben sandwich like the recipe suggests, but I could find any sauerkraut in my local Lidl so I just had it with some vegan mayonnaise.

I don't know if it's because I've only had cheap corned beef, or American corned beef is different to English corned beef, but this didn't taste anything like corned beef. It tasted better- I could really taste the various spices, I was a bit worried as I managed to add double the amount of cloves and red pepper by mistake but it was just the right level of spice for me.

There is still loads left, I'm planning to visit our new Polish supermarket tomorrow and pick me up some sauerkraut for reubens throughout the week.