Well, I decided recently I want to share more of my life on my website. If you’re subscribed to my individual blog posts, you’ll be seeing more recipes, my thoughts on things, and even regular writing posts on here without art always accompanying it. I hope you enjoy this unfolding! As always, I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments or just shoot me an email back!
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Anyway, I have to say, the holidays bring out the chef in me! I could barely find a non-vegan recipe online of Chicken Maria’s Way, let alone something vegan, so I figured I could contribute one. And, no, I don’t know who Maria is, haha!
This scrumptious, decadent dish has been a family holiday staple ever since I was little – my grandmother made it for my mom, and she made it for us! Chicken, broccoli, peaches, and sour cream + mayo don’t sound like they go together but you’d be missing out to not give it a try. The flavor combo is outstanding and totally unique!
The original we ate growing up was similar to this one and for my veganized version, I borrowed aspects of the vegan “chicken” from this recipe. We used seitan as the base for the chicken, and in our experience seitan is most pleasant to eat when it’s sliced thinner, so that’s why we stuck with thin cutlets instead of bigger “breast” pieces. If you try this recipe let me know what you think!
INGREDIENTS
Cutlets: Wet Ingredients
1 1/2 cups chickpeas, canned or already cooked (drained)
1/2 cup veggie broth
3 tbsp soy sauce
Cutlets: Dry Ingredients
3/4 cup vital wheat gluten
1 cup panko bread crumbs
3/4 tsp poultry seasoning (usually contains sage, thyme, rosemary, & nutmeg)
pinch of Salt and Pepper
Other
1 crown broccoli, roughly chopped
1 can cling peach halves in syrup, drained
1/4 cup vegan parmesan cheese (this is what we use)
Dredging for cutlets
3/4 cup all purpose flour
Breading
2 cups pecan crumbs
1/2 cup avocado oil
1 tablespoons paprika
1⁄2 teaspoon sea salt
INSTRUCTIONS
MAKE CUTLETS:
– Combine wet ingredients: Mash drained chickpeas in a large mixing bowl. Whisk in the vegetable broth and soy sauce with the mashed chickpeas.
– Add in dry ingredients: vital wheat gluten, panko, poultry seasoning, salt, and pepper, and then stir to combine. When a dough forms, knead / pound with hands until it no longer crumbles, 5-8 minutes. Pounding the dough for at least 5 minutes is THE MOST IMPORTANT STEP. Otherwise the seitan will be spongey and chewy.
– Once kneaded, the dough will be quite firm and elastic. Using a rolling pin, beat the dough into a thin, rough rectangle shape; around 1/4″ thick. Set the dough aside to rest for 10 minutes.
– Preheat oven to 425 F.
– Combine all purpose flour with a pinch of salt into a large bowl. Cut dough into cutlets about the size of your hand. Place cutlets into the flour and coat one side, then flip and repeat with all the remaining pieces.
ASSEMBLE CASSEROLE:
– In a pie tin or shallow dish, pour the pecan crumbs. In a separate pie tin mix together olive oil, paprika, and salt.
– Lightly grease a 9×13 inch casserole dish.
– Dip the cutlets in the oil mixture, then in the pecan crumbs. Press the bread crumbs to each cutlet so they are coated. Arrange each cutlet in the prepared baking dish so that they don’t touch each other, then repeat with the remaining patties. Top with any remaining oil and pecan crumbs.
– Bake for about 30 minutes or until the patties are very firm; flip them after 15 minutes.
– While waiting for the cutlets to cook, steam or boil broccoli chunks in a pot of water for 5 minutes, until softened.
– When the cutlets are done, take out the casserole dish. Wipe out the fallen crumbs. Drain the broccoli and peaches, and arrange in casserole dish beside the cutlets.
– Combine vegenaise and vegan sour cream to make the creamy sauce, and you can make more to your liking. The ratio is half mayo, half sour cream. Pour over the peaches, cutlets, and broccoli. Top with vegan parmesan cheese and extra paprika. Serve and enjoy!