Every morning here at Sideways Cottage, James makes me a cup of coffee and himself a cup of green tea, after which he proceeds to exercise for a couple of hours while I….lazily read the paper in bed and chat (and exchange Wordle scores) online with various friends and relatives. Once James has completed his routine, he refills my coffee and we chat about our all important dinner plans. This morning, he expressed a desire for a dish he favoured in his pre-vegetarian days–takeout-style Chinese beef and broccoli. I spent a bit of time online and soon discovered a recipe I could easily convert to a vegan version.

This delicious dish is based on this well-reviewed, easy recipe from Natasha’s Kitchen. Of course, I subbed the meat for seitan; however, for some reason, the seitan beef seemed to suck up all the sauce, so I ended up doubling the sauce recipe. I also added mushrooms and water chestnuts. The result was absolutely delicious!

Vegan “Beef” and Broccoli

Mix together in a jar and shake well:

• 2 tsp fresh grated ginger
• 4 tsp minced garlic
• 1 cup hot water
• 2/3 cup soy sauce
• 1/3 cup packed light brown sugar
• 3 TBS corn starch
• 1/2 tsp black pepper 
• 1/4 cup sesame oil

Set aside.

Next, saute in a lightly oiled cast-iron skillet until crispy:

• 8 ounces of sliced button mushrooms

Remove from heat and set aside in a bowl. Next saute….

• 8 cups broccoli florets until al dente

Remove from heat and set aside in a bowl. Next, saute….

• 500 grams seitan “beef” (I used this “steak” recipe without the red wine)

Once the seitan is nicely browned, add the sauce and simmer until the sauce thickens a bit:

Next, add:

• 1 small can water chestnuts

Next add the mushrooms and broccoli and mix well. Simmer until everything is heated through.

Serve over brown basmati rice with a sprinkle of sesame seeds.

Yeah, yeah, I know. The rice in the picture is clearly white. I did try, but it turned out that James had used all the brown rice for Poppy’s special dog food!! I wasn’t THAT disappointed though since I actually looooove white basmati rice.

And the song of the day is Joan Osborn’s “One of Us” because Emily texted me today with a “lyric emergency” about this song. It was a favourite of ours back in 1996 when Em was seven and we would belt it out in the car as I drove her to school or to one of her various drama/dance/music classes. Once we had Em’s cousin, Stefan, in the car with us and Stefan misunderstood our singing of the song as a kind of poetry challenge:

I sang, “What if God was one of us…”

Em sang, “Just a slob like one of us…”

Stefan had clearly never heard the song, but that didn’t stop him from contributing in a sweet little soprano: “…with a body full of pus!”