If you've looked at any of my other posts you know by now that I'm not vegan, or even vegetarian except for those stints in between meals containing meat. However, my fondness for Indian cuisine among others has made it clear that there are an infinite array of options for meals full of flavor. In part because I've been in rehab for a couple of months nursing a torn tendon, I'm more attentive than usual to getting a broad array of nutrients into my system. I figured I might be able to get that accomplished without meat, so here's a full meal plan that start to finish took 45 minutes.
Some things it requires having around the house:
- canned chipotle peppers in adobo
- canned black beans (or if you're feeling industrious a good recipe for simmering them in advance is here)
The meal will give you enough of everything for tacos for 4 and a corn-kale vegetable side for that many too.
Ingredients:
Vegetable side:
- 3-4 cups fresh kale, chopped
- 2 cups frozen or (maybe June-August if you live near Nebraska) fresh sweet corn
- olive oil, salt, cumin and some kind of ground chile (we used ancho powder)
- 1lb seasoned seitan (ours was lightly marinated in soy sauce)
- 2 cups cooked black beans, partially mashed so the consistency is like refried beans
- 1 avocado
- salsa
- 1 lime
- 2 chipotle peppers, finely chopped with their adobo sauce
- salt
- 2-3 taco size tortillas per person (we used flour)
- Make some quick guac (recipe here at this older post on SDN)
- Heat a skillet to medium, lightly pan grill the tortillas in a tbsp or so of olive oil, wrap in a towel and put to the side.
- Turn the skillet up to medium high, add 2tbsp olive oil and the kale. Sprinkle some cumin, salt and chile powder over it, cover for a couple of minutes so it begins to wilt, then uncover and stir. Add the corn, stir, let it sit a minute and brown on one side, then flip and let the other side brown. 4-5 minutes with both vegetables in there should be enough.
- Scoop the corn & kale into a serving bowl, give the skillet a quick rinse and add some more olive oil. Toss in the seitan, stir to coat lightly with oil and add the chipotles and adobo. Squeeze 3 lime quarters over the seitan, toss once and let it sit a couple of minutes to brown. Turn, let brown again and put that into a bowl. Prepare a bowl of black beans to bring with you.
- Bring everything to the table. Schmear a spoonful of black beans onto a tortilla, scoop some seitan on top of it, add guac and salsa. Get yourself some corn and kale. Put in mouth. The smoky/salty of the seitan is pretty meat-like, no?
Enjoy! #singledadninja