Vegan Char Siu Seitan - Vegan Chinese BBQ Pork

I found this easy and ingenious recipe on Cooking With Leyla.   Leyla has a great explanation of what Seitan is on her blog also.  So, this is all Leyla.  I used her easy Seitan recipe, which is versatile and can be used for lots of things, such as chiken pieces for a stir fry or pot pie, etc.  I found the NOH Chinese Barbecue Char Siu Seasoning Mix packet in the Asian section of my local grocery store.  The way Leyla makes her recipe, half of the seitan is used for Char Siu and the other half is cooked and set aside for other recipes.  You will easily get several dishes out of this seitan.  This easy char siu would be fantastic in my Local Hawaiian Fried Rice, or in Char Siu Bao, using the Bao Buns recipe also on this site.  I used this char siu to make David Chang's Momofuku Noodle Bar "Pork" Buns.  I used the chiken pieces half of Leyla's recipe for my Vegan Chicken Salad.  I like the taste of homemade seitan better than store-bought, every time.
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Vegan Char Siu Seitan  or  Vegan Chinese BBQ Pork

Makes: 

INGREDIENTS
2.25 Cups gluten flour (Vital Wheat Gluten) such as Bob's Red Mill brand
1 Cup water
1 vegetable bouillon (or 1 teaspoon Better Than Bouillon)
1/2 teaspoon Baking Powder
1 Tablespoon Tamari sauce

COOKING BROTH
10 Cups water
2 vegetable bouillon cubes (or 2 teaspoons Better Than Bouillon)
2 Tablespoons Tamari sauce
3-4 slices of fresh ginger (at least 1" x 1" each)

and
NOH Chinese Barbecue Char Siu Seasoning Mix (1 or 2 packets)

DIRECTIONS
Heat the one cup of water,  add bouillon, and mix until dissolved.
Let water sit until it's room temperature.
Add Tamari to the water and stir.

Put gluten flour and baking powder into a mixing bowl, and dry whisk.
Add the one Cup of bouillon water and bring together.
You can use a spoon but you'll have to use your hands at the end.
I added a couple more Tablespoons of water, I think.
Turn dough out onto a lightly-floured surface and knead about 30 times.
Put dough into a clean, oiled bowl, cover with a towel and let rest for 15-20 minutes.

Cut dough into four sections.
Stretch each section into a long oblong.
Put 2 of the 4 sections aside to marinate whole for char siu.
Cut the other two stretched sections into half-inch pieces.

In a very large pot, bring 10 Cups of water to boil.
Add bouillon cubes or Better Than Bouillon, and Tamari and ginger.
Reduce heat to a simmer.
Add the smaller pieces of dough in 15-20 pieces at a time, because the seitan will swell in size as it cooks.
Let simmer 15-20 minutes.
Using a slotted spoon or spider strainer, lift cooked seitan pieces from the pot,  and set aside to cool in a colander.**
Then cook the two large pieces of char-siu seitan, in the same way.

TO FINISH THE CHAR SIU
Once they are cooked, marinate the two large char siu seitan chunks in the NOH sauce mix for almost 24 hours.  This will simply entail adding 1/2 Cup water to the dry seasoning packet mix to make the marinade.  I used two packets for ease, but one is fine.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
Line a sided baking sheet with parchment paper and place a metal cooling rack on it.
Put the two marinated seitan chunks on the rack.
Bake in oven for 30 minutes; 15 minutes each side.
Remove from oven, and let stand about 3 minutes.
Slice (I sliced mine about 1/4 inch or 1/3 inch thick).
Use char siu in fried rice, or char siu bao.

**You can then freeze the smaller pieces of seitan in portions for future dishes.
To use frozen seitan, remove from freezer at least one hour before cooking.

Notes:  Leyla suggests that you could alternate the flavour of the seitan in the dough stage.  Add liquid smoke to make "bacon" or poultry spice to make "chicken," etc.