I know. Ya girl was gone for a whole 8 months, and the first recipe she posts is for brown blobs.
But hear me out.
We’ve made this recipe… a lot in the past few months. Like, every week. Sometimes twice per week!
Chewy little protein-packed nuggets served alongside every and any dipping sauce we have in the house. Plus a veggie or two. It’s a great, filling meal.
Mark and I have been working out quite a bit lately, so I’ve been a little more conscious of my protein intake these days. If you split this recipe into thirds, each serving would have roughly 30g of plant-based protein. Perfect to fuel those mad gains!
Before making this recipe, I’d had some experience with seitan. I have a baked seitan recipe here on the blog (flavored with Italian seasoning, definitely on the firmer side, and really good chopped small and sprinkled over your fave pasta!), and I actually wrote an article for a local publication about the best vegan wings in Pittsburgh (all of which were seitan-based).
But I’d never made seitan nuggets before. And I had gotten away from making my baked seitan recipe because it requires 90 minutes to bake and an overnight chill in the fridge before it’s ready to eat. It’s delicious, it’s worth the effort, but I wanted something simpler.
Enter: these seitan nuggets. I found a recipe on Liv B’s site, and she said they only required 15 minutes in the Instant Pot.
15 minutes vs. 90 minutes… I needed to give it a try!
We tried them, we loved them, we iterated on them and made them our own, and now I’m super thrilled to show you the recipe today!
The main ingredient in any seitan is a fun little flour called vital wheat gluten. It’s pure gluten, so it’s high in protein and makes for a super chewy, meat-like seitan (gluten is the thing that makes baked goods so chewy!).
We’ll also add a single tablespoon of chickpea flour to the mix, as it makes the chew a little less intense. I haven’t tried leaving it out yet, but I’m almost positive it would still turn out okay.
For the seasonings, feel free to make it your own. We always stick to a mix of smoked paprika, nutritional yeast, granulated garlic, and Trader Joe’s Vegan Chicken-less Seasoning Salt, but anything would work –– Italian seasoning, granulated onion, Mexican spices… you name it.
You then mix all that together and then add broth (veggie or a vegan chicken-style broth) or water to make a dough. Tear off small chunks, add it to your Instant Pot with more broth/water, and cook for 15 minutes. So simple, and definitely one of those, “Oh crap, what are we going to have for dinner tonight?” lifesavers.
The last step is totally optional, but I like to brown the sides of the seitan after it’s cooked in a pan with some oil. I find that the crispy sides does a ton for its texture. They have craggly sides thanks to you pulling apart the dough, and I loooove when they get all crisped up! Mark likes it both ways, but I really do prefer it browned!
Then pick your favorite sauce(s) and go to town! We’ve been loving the Carolina Gold BBQ Sauce from Trader Joe’s, but any ol’ vegan BBQ sauce, buffalo sauce, ranch, aioli, mustard, ketchup, etc. would be splendid!
Excited for you to try this one! Seitan nugs 4 life!
PrintInstant Pot Seitan Nuggets
Chewy, simple vegan seitan nuggets made in the Instant Pot! You’ll love this quick and easy plant-based protein-packed recipe!
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 30 minutes
- Total Time: 40 minutes
- Yield: 3 servings
- Category: Dinner
- Method: Instant Pot
- Cuisine: American
- Diet: Vegan
Ingredients
- 120g vital wheat gluten*
- 1 tablespoon chickpea flour
- 1 tablespoon nutritional yeast
- 1/2 teaspoon granulated garlic
- 3/4 teaspoon smoked paprika
- 1 teaspoon vegan chicken seasoning salt**
- 1/3 teaspoon kosher salt
- a few cranks of freshly-ground pepper
- 3/4 cup + 1 tablespoon water or low-sodium broth* (plus 1 and 1/2 cups for cooking)
- 1–2 tablespoons oil, for cooking
Instructions
- In a large bowl, combine your vital wheat gluten, chickpea flour, nutritional yeast, granulated garlic, smoked paprika, vegan chicken seasoning salt, salt, and pepper. Whisk to combine.
- Add your 3/4 cup + 1 tablespoon of water or broth, and mix with a wooden spoon to combine. It will form a spongey dough. Knead 10-15 times in the bowl, and then set aside.
- In your Instant Pot bowl, add your remaining 1 and 1/2 cups of water or broth. Slightly flatten your seitan dough, and pull small chunks off to create your nuggets. I tend to try make mine in the ~1 Tbsp. of dough/nugget-range, but it’s not an exact measurement (you can see the photos in the post to use as an example!). Be aware that they will puff up and grow larger after they’re cooked. Place the nuggets in the water/broth in your Instant Pot in one even layer.
- Add the lid to your Instant Pot, set the vent to Sealing, and Pressure Cook on High for 15 minutes.
- After 15 minutes, immediately and carefully release the steam. Remove the lid and drain your nuggets in a strainer. Allow them to drain for 10 minutes.
- Heat a large skillet over medium heat with a tablespoon or two of oil. Add your drained nuggets to the hot oil and cook to brown the sides, flipping to brown both sides, 6-8 minutes.
- Remove from the pan, add your favorite sauce, and dive on in!
Notes
*It’s important that you don’t overmeasure the vital wheat gluten, so I highly recommend using a scale to make sure you have 120g!
**I like Trader Joe’s Vegan Chicken-less Seasoning Salt here, but feel free to use whatever poultry seasoning you’d like. If your mix doesn’t have salt, I’d suggest upping the salt to 1/2 teaspoon of kosher salt. You can also leave this out and use a vegan chicken-style broth. Super customizable!
For the seasonings, feel free to make it your own. Mexican seasonings, Italian seasonings, etc. would all work great!
This recipe was slightly adapted from Liv B!
The flavour was good and the recipe was quick to mix up. The texture was not what I was hoping for, though. I wanted something firm enough to put in a sate sauce over rice but the nuggets fell apart a good deal while cooking and even more when I put them in the sauce.