displaced.vegan

In my local supermarket there are only two holiday turkey substitutes: Tofurky & Field Roast.  For Thanksgiving this last year I bought the small Tofurky.  As laziness would have it, I didn’t cook it for Thanksgiving.  But a few days later when I was housesitting I brought my Tofurky with me and cooked it there.  And then for Christmas I decided to give the Field Roast product a try.

Now, let me say, I like Tofurky.  But I think a lot of the variation in people’s taste experience is in the preparation.  So it can be a hit or miss ordeal.  Unfortunately, it is cost prohibitive to purchase Tofurky with the sole intention of experimenting until you get it just how you like it.

Field Roast’s Celebration Feast is smaller than even the small Tofurky log, but unless you are feeding a large vegan family then it shouldn’t matter.  Field Roast is DELICIOUS no matter how you might cook it.  It’s savory and the stuffing is yummilicious.  It’s uncanny in that the method they use to prepare it makes it outwardly resemble actual meat.  I had to look at the label several times to reassure myself that is was in fact Vegan. Of all the pictures that I am sure I have taken, this picture of the cut up Field Roast is all I can manage to find:

In my opinion, Field Roast’s Celebration Feast is the BEST of the two options.  But the journey doesn’t end there.  I have an out of print cookbook that has a recipe for creating your own un-turkey.  And I think I have just about everything I need.  So in the very near future I will be doing some experimentation with that.  Stay tuned!

I am fortunate enough to have Vital Wheat Gluten in my grocery store of choice. But were I not, I guess I would have to make my own gluten-y goodness. Gluten is a protein of sorts that exists in wheat. When you overwork wheat you work up the gluten. That is why you don’t overmix batters. If you did, you would have too much gluten and the end product would be chewy. For the fake meat seitan, this is a good thing. The chewiness of gluten creates a meaty texture.

I recently picked up a used copy of the now out of print ‘The Now & Zen Epicure’ which has many many wonderful recipes in it. And it also has instructions for making your own gluten-y dough in place of that made with Vital Wheat Gluten. I’m sure you can find this elsewhere, but here, poorly transcribed for the lazy is the Homemade Gluten recipe:

3 lbs (or more) high gluten whole wheat flour
3 cups (or more) water

The author notes that regular whole wheat flour will not work and tells you to ask for a good bread making flour.? I learned from Alton Brown that bread machine flour? is very high in gluten.

This “recipe” calls for 3lbs of flour, but if your bowl will hold more then add more.? The gist is that it takes the same amount of work so you might as well do as much as you can while you’re at it.

Place all your flour in your large bowl and mix in your water to form a very firm dough and allow it to rest for at least an hour.? Then move your bowl to your sink.? You’ll probably be here for a while.

Fill your bowl with water and start massaging your dough.? As the water washes out the starch it will begin to turn white.? Discard this water and replace, repeating this process over and over again.? THe author suggests 10-15 minutes.? Your dough should start to shrink as the bran and starch wash away and at some point it may seem to be falling apart.? Don’t fear, that part is expected.

“When it looks like you have a giant wad of well-chewed bubble gum, you have transformed flour into raw gluten.”

this will yield a rather bland gluten dough which will be dependent upon your cooking method for adding flavor.? And this book has several cooking suggestions that I will share in the future as I try them.? For now, that’s all you get.

I’ve recently been feeling achy and lethargic like when I had mono as a teen. And then a handful of days ago I broke out all over my face. I haven’t had any breakouts since going vegan except for hormonal reasons. And even then, they breakouts have been very mild. I’ve also been coughing quite a bit and my asthma has been acting up. This leads me to believe that some dairy has made it’s way into my diet somehow. But while I’m fairly certain that dairy is the culprit behind the resurgence in my asthma, I think something more sinister is responsible for the lethargy, aches, itching, etc.

My brother recently learned that he has a dairy and wheat intolerance. He probably has the same sugar problem that my mother (and probably I) have. But none of this will change what he eats. My brother is the type of person who refuses to be bullied by his body. He’ll eat what he wants and show his body who is boss. But this got me wondering if maybe I have a wheat/gluten intolerance. Many food allergies go relatively unnoticed, only surfacing when we get too much of the foods our bodies can’t tolerate. And in eliminating dairy and meat from my diet I have been substituting a lot with soy and wheat products. So if I have a latent allergy, now would be the time for it to surface.

For those of us without health insurance, finding out what your food allergies might be is difficult. But if you have inexplicable migraines, lethargy, aches and pains and are lucky enough to have health insurance you should ask your doctor to do a blood test for allergens. The scratch test they do it good for severe allergies, but probably won’t catch mild allergies that still cause you distress. If your Insurance provider will cover it, I recommend it.

If you don’t have health insurance then the most common way to prove a food allergy is through an elimination diet. But I’m far too lazy for that. So I guess at this point I am just gonna hope and what passes for “pray” that I’m not allergic to wheat. I can handle a soy allergy. It would be a bitch since so many things contain soy, but I can find new beverage and “cheese” alternatives that aren’t soy based. But I’m going to have a hard to finding un-meats that are gluten free. And there is the bread and pasta problem. Wheat is in everything. It’s actually a wonder that more people aren’t gluten-intolerant, considering how much is in out regular diets. Although maybe more people are. We have a lot of unexplained symptoms and poor health in our society which I am am pretty certain can be traced back to what we ingest.

Hopefully when I get back home from housesitting and have more control over my diet I’ll be able to sort this out. Because I was just starting to get the hang of this Vegan thing. I don’t need a food allergy to make life difficult.