Palmerston Gardens

Crispy ‘Wings’

Today was a rainy Sunday afternoon and since my record player stopped working, I knew that the only way I’d be happy would be to get creative in the kitchen and make some almost authentic crispy wings. 

Similar to the BBQ bites that I made earlier this year, but more wing like. 

I went into China Town and found this crazy dry root called Glehnia, which I used as the ‘wing bone.’

I then reduced the cooking time of my last recipe to keep the seitan even more tender, and decided to improve my coating by investing in some Panko (which is actually super cheap at Essence of Life). 

Oh, I also cut out some of the more difficult steps from the previous recipe in hopes that more people would be interested in giving this a shot. These are officially easy to make.

I found a great chicken seitan recipe from Voracious and although I didn’t use their ingredients, I did borrow the cooking method - so kudos to them for that.

Get our your napkins, this one is a salivator. 

Ingredients:

1 bag of Glehnia sticks, broken into wing size bones. You can find these in China Town (or get creative. Bamboo? Skewers? Barbie Doll Legs?)

dry/mix

1 tsp bbq  spice (this can be found at Taste of Nature, Kensington)

1 tsp garlic powder

1 tbls paprika

1 tsp cumin

2 cups vital gluten flour

wet/mix

3tbls braggs

8 squirts, liquid smoke ( I used the Hickory for this version)

1 1/3 cups - broth (I used fake chicken broth)

broth (different from above, used to simmer the seitan)

4 cups water

1/4 cup braggs

few squirts liquid smoke

wet mix/breading

1/2 cupflour

1 cup water

dry mix/breading

3 cups panko

2 tsp oregano

2 tsp basil

2 tsp paprika

1 tsp garlic

1 tsp pepper

1 tsp salt

Oil for frying.

Your fav BBQ Sauce/Hot Sauce

Directions:

Stir together all dry/mix ingredients.

In separate bowl, mix the wet/mix ingredients.

Combine and knead with hands. mold into a ball and cut into discs. 

Add to broth and simmer for 20-30 minutes, checking the texture every 5-10 minutes, When desired texture is reached, remove from heat and let cool (still in broth). This is an important step. You want the seitan to be firm, but not too firm. To put it in perspective, if this were pulled pork, you could easily tear it apart. You want it to be harder than that. 

As the seitan is cooling, prepare wet and dry breading in separate bowls and heat a little oil in a pot (don’t use a pan, you could burn yourself).

Once cool, cut your seitan into wing pieces. Slide the bone into the end, dip each piece into your wet mix, and coat with panko batter. 

Fry each side for a good few minutes until super crispiness has been reached. Remember, you do not need a lot of oil for this (maybe a half inch thick), but if your oil is not hot enough, it will just soak into your food. The hotter, the better (without it burning, obvs). 

In a frying pan, warn your fav BBQ sauce mixed with your fav Hot sauce (or skip this step if you want to just have plain Crispy WIngs). 

Pat the wings with cloth/paper towel to remove excess oil and toss in sauce. 

Now call me, tell me how it went, and bask in the glory that is crispy wings. WITH BONES.

My dream is to one day be able to sit with my friends in the pub, while enjoying pitchers of draught, the game on the telly, and some wings. This recipe just got me that much closer. Now if I could only convince the Wheat Sheaf to sell them……

Enjoy.

DL