With it’s savory taste and chewy texture seitan is a great replacement for meat. Just replace any dish a few pieces and you instantly have a environmentally friendly meal. It also has a crazy amount of protein per serving so it’s great for athletes and bodybuilders alike.

First of all I’d like to validate the cost benefits of Seitan. Seitan is basically just boiled wheat gluten (aka the protein from gluten) with spices and flavouring. The recipe that I use also has nutritional yeast added so I’ve included it in this analysis.

Let’s pull out Excel.

Food Calories per 100g Protein Protein % per calorie Price per 100 cal Price per 20g Protein Boneless Skinless Chicken Breast 110 23 84% $2.00 $1.91 Boneless Skinless Chicken Thigh 119 20 67% $1.02 $1.21 Pork Chops 123 21 68% $0.89 $1.05 Lean Ground Beef 254 17 27% $0.55 $1.66 Sirloin Steak 143 21 59% $1.28 $1.74 Lean Ground Chicken 143 17 48% $0.85 $1.44 Salmon 208 20 38% $0.95 $1.98 Gluten Flour 370 75 81% $0.35 $0.35 Nutritional Yeast 281 50 71% $0.83 $0.94

All of these numbers were taken from nutritionaldata.self.com and prices were taken from the local grocery and bulk food store in my area. The below links show the full spreadsheet and prices.

Spreadsheet

Prices

The important numbers to note are that both Gluten Flour and Nutritional Yeast are significantly cheaper than the meat products and yet still relatively high in protein density (only being lower to boneless, skinless chicken breast).

Clearly if you’re looking to be economical, seitan is something you should look into.

On to the recipe!

For a step by step process check out the video

Ingredients 2 cups gluten flour

1/2 cup nutritional yeast

1/2 tbsp chili powder

1/2 tbsp onion powder

1/2 tbsp ground cumin

1 /2 tbsp salt

1/4 tbsp pepper

3 tbsp soy sauce

1 vegetable bouillon cube

2 x 1 cup of water Directions place the bouillon cube in one cup of water and microwave for 1 minute or until dissolved mix all dry ingredients together until combined pour the dissolved bouillon cube, second cup of water and the soy sauce into the dry ingredients and mix. Be careful as the mixture may be hot kneed the mixture until all of the powder is combined. You may need to add a bit more water if the gluten flour isn’t being absorbed. Let the dough sit for 20 minutes and start to boil a large pot of water Once rested for 20 minutes, cut half of the dough into 1 inch pieces and drop into boiling water Allow to boil for 5 minutes or until all pieces are floating and have stopped exanding using a strainer, remove the seitan pieces and repeat steps 6 and 7 for the other half of the dough

A quarter of this recipe will give you:

286 Calories

13.3g Carbs

1.3g Fat

51.2 Protein

Now that your seitan is ready, add it to anything!

Pizza!



Sushi!



Or even stir fried with your favourite sauce



Give it a try and let me know what you think!