Seitan Marbella

This is a dish adapted from a coworker’s adaptation of Chicken Marbella from the Silver Palate Cookbook. I’m a sucker for sweet-and-salty combinations and this one has a titillating balance of soft prunes and tangy piquant olives and capers. It packs a lot of flavor so I suggest to serve it with comforty-smooth mashed potatoes. If you’re the spawn of vegetable-loving folk such as I am, you could also add a side of steamed carrots or sautéed eggplant but a simple romaine salad could also do the trick.

This Seitan Marbella is an easy dish alright but there’s something about the contrasting flavors and textures that impresses guests when really all there is to it is a bit of measuring and potato-peeling like you’re a Private First Class on the Battleship SS Simple. This recipe even has prunes, for goodness sakes, something that’s so ironically appealing it could only be embraced some someone as cool as, well, you.

Serves: 4
Time: 35 minutes

Seitan Marbella

1 cup pitted prunes, roughly chopped
1 cup Spanish green olives left whole
1/2 cup capers, with juice
1/2 cup red wine vinegar
1/2 cup of white wine
1/2 head garlic, peeled and chopped
olive oil
1 Tbl dried oregano
1 tsp salt
16 oz. seitan, drained and chopped into bite-sized pieces

In a bowl, measure and mix together the prunes, olives, capers, vinegar and white wine.

Sauté the garlic in a little olive oil in a pot or wok for a few minutes until fragrant and soft.

Add the olives and liquids and start to cook down while chunking the seitan and adding it to the pan. Add the oregano and salt. Simmer until enough liquid has evaporated but so you still have some nice saucy stuff left to pour over your mashed potatoes.

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 19th, 2007 at 7:38 pm and is filed under Stovetop & Skillet, Spring, Winter. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.