Serves 6 to 8
Active time: 1 hour || Total time: 2 hours
I know. I’m posting a roast recipe on the Tuesday evening before Thanksgiving. I’m sure everyone already has their menus planned and I’m late to the party. But this roast almost drove me to the brink of madness Call of Cthulu style, so I had to defeat it! And defeat it I did.
After about 20 years and twice as many tries I’ve got a fabulous centerpiece stuffed roast that I’m proud to show off to the neighbors. Succulent seitan stuffed with herbed meaty shiitakes and leeks. The seitan is mixed with pureed pinto beans to give it great, juicy texture and even a hint of pink color. It’s really similar to my sausage recipes which I used as a base recipe. The stuffing is coated with bread crumbs, which keep it perfectly packed into the roast when you slice it, instead of falling out all over the place. It all comes together when baked in a familiar tinfoil wrapping.
I don’t know what took me so long to get it right. Maybe someday I’ll be ready to talk about it. But right now, let’s get roasting!
There are a few recipe notes before you begin:
~For best results, use a salty homemade vegetable broth. Salt is integral to the flavor of the seitan, so if your broth isn’t seasoned then add a teaspoon or so of salt to it.
~You’ll also want to spoon broth over the roast before serving, to keep it from being dry. Of course you’re going to be coating it in gravy, too. But the broth is a nice touch. If you’re slicing and serving, ladle on spoonfuls of broth on each individual slice, too. You can’t have too much juice, here!
~This roast reheats perfectly. Refrigerate in its wrapper for up to 3 days before hand. When ready to serve, preheat an oven to 350 F and cook for 20 minutes. This will dry it out a bit, so use the broth hints above for sure!
~Use a steak knife for the easiest slicing.
~I used storebought breadcrumbs but if you use homemade, use 3/4 cup.
~This makes enough for 6 hungry people. If it’s not Thanksgiving or another holiday, and people are not totally stuffing their faces, it serves at least 8.
For the filling:
2 tablespoons olive oil
6 oz shiitake mushrooms, thinly sliced (rough ends removed)
2 leeks, white and light green parts only, cut into thin half moons
1/2 teaspoon salt
Fresh black pepper
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons fresh chopped thyme
1/4 cup breadcrumbs
1/4 cup vegetable broth
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
For the roast
3 cloves garlic
3/4 cup cooked pinto beans, rinsed and drained (fresh or canned)
1 1/2 cups vegetable broth
3 tablespoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 cups vital wheat gluten
1/3 cup nutritional yeast
1 teaspoon fennel seeds, crushed or finely chopped
1 teaspoon sweet paprika
1 teaspoon dried thyme, crushed between your fingers
1 teaspoon dried sage, crushed between your fingers
Several dashes fresh black pepper
First prepare the filling:
Preheat a large pan, preferably cast iron, over medium heat. Saute the mushrooms and leeks in oil until soft, about 10 minutes. Add salt, pepper, garlic and thyme. Cook for about 2 more minutes, stirring often.
Sprinkle in the breadcrumbs and toss to coat. Cook the mixture, stirring very often, until the breadcrumbs are toasty and the mixture is relatively dry. This should take about 5 minutes, and the breadcrumbs should turn a few shades darker.
Drizzle in the broth and lemon juice and toss to coat until moist. If it still seems dry drizzle in a little extra olive oil. Set aside until ready to use.
Prepare the roast:
Preheat oven to 350 F. In a food processor, pulse the garlic until well chopped. Add the beans, broth, olive oil and soy sauce and puree until mostly smooth (a few pieces of bean are okay, but they should be no bigger than a pea.)
In a large mixing bowl, mix together the wheat gluten, nutritional yeast, herbs and spices. Make a well in the center and add the bean mixture. Stir with a wooden spoon until the mixture starts coming together to form a ball of dough. Knead until everything is well incorporated.
Now we’re going to roll out the seitan and form the roast. Place two pieces of tin foil (about 18 inches long) horizontally in front of you. The sheet further from you should overlap the closer sheet by about 6 inches. This way you have enough foil to wrap around the whole roast.
On a separate surface, use your hands or a rolling pin to flatten the seitan into a roughly 12 x 10 rectangle. If any pieces rip, don’t worry about it, just use a pinch of dough from the ends to repair any holes.
Place the filling in the lower 1/3 of the seitan rectangle, leaving about 2 inches of space at both ends. Make sure the filling is compact, use your hands to form it into a nice, tight bundle.
Now roll! Roll the bottom part of the seitan up and over the filling. Keep rolling until in it’s in a log shape. Now pinch together the seam and pinch together the sides to seal. It doesn’t have to be perfect, it will snap into shape when baking.
Place the roll in the center of the tinfoil and roll up like a tootsie roll, making sure the ends are tightly wrapped. Transfer to a baking sheet and bake for an hour*. Rotate the roll every 20 minutes for even cooking.
* I may update the time in this recipe because I’ve gotten a few comments that said it took up to 90 minutes to cook completely! So for now I would say just do a test my poking the roll with tongs. It should feel very very firm. If it doesn’t, then bake further.
Remove from oven and let cool. Unwrap, slice and serve! (See recipe notes for keeping moist and reheating.)
I made this loaf for Thanksgiving yesterday, and it was wonderful! I posted step-by-step pictures of the process on my blog, like some other people did. It’s always fun to be able to go back and watch the evolution of delicious food!
(Also, thanks for the time update. I kept cooking it longer and longer and thought I was going crazy, since my oven usually burns things instead of undercooking them.)
Thanks so much for posting this recipe. We were bummed about not having the cash to buy a Tofurky roast this year, but I made this for Thanksgiving yesterday and it was ridiculously good. My husband said it’s “just as good as Tofurky” and I think it’s even better, and cheaper, and it was so easy to make. My non-veg cousin and his girlfriend really liked it, too. And we just ate the leftovers for dinner tonight. I already want to make it again! Oh, and 50 minutes was perfect for the cook time, although I did let it sit for about 20 minutes before slicing.
Made it for Thanksgiving, was awesome, thank you!
This was super, and as Thanksgiving dishes should, it was even better as leftovers the next day. I preferred it without gravy…the wonderful flavor was too muted by the gravy. Add me to the list of folks that had to cook for more than 50mins…more like 90mins for me as well. I use Bob’s Red Mill VWG, not sure if that matters?
Thanks for all you do Isa.
This was amazing! I filled mine with regular bready stuffing instead (about half a package of Vegan Stuffing mix from Whole Foods) and baked it for 50 minutes and it turned out great. I flipped it over upside down twice during cooking and it created a nice brown crust, yum. Can’t wait to make it again for Christmas! Thanks Isa for being so awesome.
Thank you for this recipe! I used a different stuffing and then wrapped the whole thing in puff pastry. It was a huge hit at Thanksgiving and disappeared quickly, even though it showed up late. Here’s my blog post about the version I made: http://northwestherbivore.com/2011/11/26/seitan-roulade-in-puff-pastry/
Looks great! Yours was a much bigger adventure than mine.
Wow. I saw this before Thanksgiving, but had already ordered a Match Vegan Stuffed Roast, so we went with that. BIG MISTAKE!!!!! OMG! It looked and tasted like sawdust, with wood shavings thrown in for good measure. Filling was ok, but my dog ended up with 7/8 of it, pretty expensive dog treat!! ($15!! Yikes) I’ll be trying this out now for sure…your recipes ROCK!!
Does anyone know if I can make this tonight and store it in the fridge before baking it tomorrow?
This looks gorgeous! I’m not even vegan and I’m bookmarking this page for later. This just looks so moist and yummy 🙂
Fancy! Amazing!
I just made it with a zucchini and onion stuffing as I didnt have any mushrooms. We arent even vego’s and my husband turns his nose up at anything other than meat n three veg, but this was a hit.
If I keep making delicious vego stuff like this I may have a chance to get him to take the vegan easy challenge next year….
loved it…
U just HAVE TO share ur gravies u mention, w/us !! PLEASE ???!!!
This was AMAZING, I made this on Thursday. Would love to see a few more seitan free recipes, especially for the holidays as I am gluten intolerant. It was so good I ate a lot anyway (darn your amazing recipes) and this left me unable to function for the better part of 16 hours (in no way your fault). I’m now on the look out for some soy based yumminess for Christmas…
amazing!! i wrapped mine in yuba and slathered it with olive oil and tamari before wrapping and baking. thank you for another plate full of amazingness!!!
This was amazing and not hard to make… Mine looked like a bit of a flattened log instead of a round roast but it was delicious!!!
Oh hell yes.
I tried this for the first time ever on Thanksgiving Day and it was AWESOME!!! Even the carnivores liked it and they (allegedly) don’t like even the idea of anything vegan. It reheated very nicely and made for two full meals. Thank you thank you for this recipe. I’m adding it to my “fancy” list. That’s the one where I try to impress people with my vegan cooking prowess. 🙂
YUK….it came out so nasty I threw it all away. Spongy, wheat gluteny tasting nastiness.
Thank you for this amazing recipe, Isa. You have to include it in one of your future cookbooks. I’ve made a couple of roasts before, with and without stuffing, and this is the best so far, by far. Both the “meat” and the stuffing blew my mind… I was trying to store the leftovers, but I kept on slicing it and eating the slices immediately.. couldn’t control myself! I used half regular mushrooms/half shiitakes. After an hour, it didn’t feel very firm, but when it still wasn’t very firm after 2 hours, I just took it out, and although it was not very firm, it was alright to cut and eat. Maybe I should have kneaded it longer? I just kneaded it long enough to incorporate everything (less than 1 minute), but I think seitan firms up when you knead it longer.
This recipe was great. Thank you so much for posting it. I made a little few chances to the stuffing, and added the ever famous puff paistry. The longer cooking time was key. I served it to my meat eating family who decided to join me in my vegan thanksgiving feast. They loved it! Success! Here’s a picture. http://i257.photobucket.com/albums/hh231/skullowl/8aa854d2.jpg
I made this for Thanksgiving dinner (to supplement the usual non-vegan options) and it was a big hit – even with the carnivores in the bunch! I followed the recipe exactly and wouldn’t change a thing!
We are having a belated ‘Thanksgiving in the UK’ this Thursday, courtesy of my Texan house guest. I said I’d make the ‘turkey substitute’ so this recipe looks perfect. Can’t wait to try!
This looks and sounds delicious! I assume it wouldn’t be a problem to sauté the mushrooms and leeks in vegetable broth instead of the olive oil. Can I also omit the oil in the roast? Should I add an equal amount of vegetable broth as a replacement? Thank you for sharing this wonderful recipe.
The crumbs won’t get toasty that way, they will just be pretty soggy. But if no-oil is your thing, then yeah, give it a whirl! Replace the oil in the roast with 3 tablespoons tomato paste and you should be fine!
i made it for thanksgiving and it came out perfectly!! I put a link to your recipe on my blog too! It was such a smash hit that I’m making it again for christmas!! thanks Isa! 😀
Thanks! Been wanting to end my addiction to the packaged version of this. I subbed white beans for the pintos and worked slight variation on the spices. But I got a little lost on the assembly directions. Why 2 pieces of foil? I wrapped it one. Also you said place the filling in the lower 1/3 of the seitan and then to roll tightly, but that send the center yumminess off to the side. How did you get yours to be in the center? Did your seitan overlap much? It’s kind of like rolling sushi but the directions didn’t quite get me there.
I needed two overlapping pieces of foil to make it wide enough to wrap. I can’t do the math, but placing the filling in the lower third ultimately landed my stuffing in the center! It was a little thicker in one place but not by much.
Hiya! I’m from the UK and a bit confuzzled as we don’t get seitan here. Is this the mix thats made with the wheat gluten, nutritional yeast, herbs and spices? Sounds lush! Can’t wait to try it 🙂 Thanks x
oh wow, this roast looks absolutely gorgeous and I am sure not even a meat eater could refuse trying it out!
Blue, you can get foods made from seitan from goodness direct in the uk (http://www.goodnessdirect.co.uk/cgi-local/frameset/script/search.html?query=seitan&snar=) or there is a recipe on how to make it yourself (that is not my recipe!) http://vegetarian.about.com/od/cookingtipstools/ss/HowToSeitan.htm and you can get wheat gluten here 🙂 http://www.honest-to-goodness.org.uk/index.php/vital-wheat-gluten-1kg.html?___store=default
amazingly delicious, I tried it out a little late for thanksgiving but it was still a lovely dinner, cheers from Italy!!!!
Hi, Iza. I was thinking about it… why isn’t it better if you steam it first for 40 minutes like your sausages and after this just open the foil and put in the oven to roast or even in a skillet pan? Could be faster, no???
By the way, the sausages from VB and marple syrup sausages are amazing! My people love them!!!
Made this tonight but just used store bought garlic and herb stuffing as husband hates mushrooms. We had it with roasted butternut squash wedges, roast potatoes, green beans and used a granule gravy. Will try and put up a blog post tomorrow. Just wanted to say that two of my naughty kitties snuck into the kitchen and stole a piece! So it gets cat seal of approval too! UK folk: honest to goodness and vx sell vital wheat gluten on their websites. Both are Vegan webstores.
Im glad you put a note about the cooking time. I made it for thanksgiving and it turned out amazing. I cooked it for 80 minutes total rotating every 20 minutes and it was perfect. The folks at tofurkey should be worried.
I made this the other night. The filling was delicious, but unfortunately, the seitan came out rather rubbery. I don’t think I took it out too early as it was in the oven for one and a half hours and the crust especially had a rubbery consistency. It was much better the next day, though.
Do you think it would still hold together if I replaced about a cup of gluten with more beans? I’m guessing that would really improve the texture, but I’m not sure it could be rolled as nicely.
Hi there! Hmm. I think you could get away with it to a degree. Sometimes different VWGs have different protein contents so results aren’t always totally consistent. Mine wasn’t rubbery at all (obviously, or I wouldn’t have posted it) but beans DO soften the texture. I would just worry about it going in the opposite direction and getting mushy if you take out that much VWG. I might start out by adding another cup of beans and only removing 1/2 cup of VWG. In any case, let us know how it turns out!
Perfecto timing, not too late at all! We got Hanukkah. We got Solstice. We got Christmas. We got Kwanzaa. We got New Year’s. All coming up! This is just in time, so look out Tofurkey! (Actually, I have never had a Tofurkey; I’ve always done other mains for the Holidaze. That is about to change).
WOW! Made this last week, and will make it again for XMAS, awesome recipe!! For some reason when I added dry and wet ingredients for the seitan it was not holding together at all and I thought I blew it but i added almost a full extra cup of gluten to get the right consistency and it worked perfectly, not sure why this happened maybe because i mixed two different brands of wheat gluten flour and one was somewhat older.
This meal is stunning. This is the 3rd Seitan recipe i have tried and so far the best one. My whole family loved it and it reheated really well with a basting of veg stock. The flavours are beautiful and it tastes great cold. I did cook it for 60 minutes followed by a further 30 minutes and it was perfect. I can’t wait to cook it again. Thanks!
Made this as the main course for a vegan beer dinner this weekend. Everyone loved it.
I just threw another one in today. I made two for Thanksgiving. I had to take shortcuts (store didn’t have leeks, used onions, used dried shiitakes that I reconstituted, used refried beans instead of mashing my own pintos, had to leave soy out for someone with allergy, etc) Anyway, it came out great! Everyone love, loved it. I think I cooked it a tad longer because I had two in there, but I think they were done just over an hour. They re-heated just fine without need for more broth, still very tender. The one I threw in today looks huge, so not sure on the time with this on.! Today I used red onion and regular herbed stuffing in the middle. Getting short on fresh groceries, but it should be good! Thank you, thank you, thank you for this recipe!
Thanks for a great recipe! I just made this today–my first foray into seitan city–and it turned out great. Followed the directions to a T–didn’t have to change a thing. My non-vegetarian husband who occasionally craves something slightly meat-like totally dug this. One thing I’d emphasize–having some sort of a sauce/gravy, as you recommend, is almost a must because it did turn out a tad bit dry. Still totally awesomely good, but even better bathed in some broth.
making a cranberry sauce, sauteed onion and stuffing stuffed one of these at the mo for an experiement fingers crossed! its in the oven as we speak. wish me luck
Thank you for this amazing dish- I served mine with red wine sauce, potato croquettes, red cabbage with chestnust and some broccoli in nut butter. It was a little bit too pale, so I roasted it for 5 minutes before slicing an the seitan turned out perfect. I had friends over for a pre-weihnukka dinner and everyone raved about the seitan.
I made this AGAIN for the second time. I don’t know what I did wrong the first time around other than not rolling it long enough. I made my veggie broth stronger and used more nutritional yeast. You definitely have to roll this out long and thin. Otherwise, you’ll end up with a soft/spongey/mush in the center…no bueno! It tasted great! I’m having it for my X-mas dinner.
Has anyone tried wrapping this in phyllo? Was thinking of trying it this way for xmas but wasn’t sure?