What is a vegan chicken?
What is vegan chicken?
Although vegan chicken is sometimes called fake meat, followers of the vegan diet can attest to the good taste of this vegetable meat, the same flavor, and texture. Vegan chicken is now being sold in the market for a reasonable price and with different chicken products to choose from. With Vegan Chicken, there is no meat used or any poultry product, but still, the demand for this faux meat is there.
What is vegan chicken made of?
Ingredients are all plant-based. Plant proteins mostly and other important ingredients such as soy, wheat gluten, textured vegetable protein, plant-based seasonings that give the chicken the flavor, appearance, and texture. Some companies even changed the appropriation by using tofu or a plant-based product like mushrooms, jackfruit, tempeh, eggplant, beans, or cauliflower.
But most of the ingredients are based on soy protein. Soybeans, as we all know, have a high amount of protein. Soybeans are used to manufacture chicken meat. The texture though differs from the real thing, what food companies do is to make the mixture of these different ingredients to look, taste, and feel like the real meat when you eat it. With the availability of the right equipment and technology, plant-based products are then made to imitate meat.
What does vegan chicken taste like?
Since chicken meat has a mild and sometimes bland flavor to it, that makes it easier to reproduce by using plant-based ingredients. There are just different recipes that give the chicken its distinctive flavor. Recipes suggest what the taste of the meat will be. Some will even use tofu to make chicken meat, seasonings, and other plant-based ingredients will just be used to add chicken taste to the tofu. There are also ways on how tofu can be made to get the same texture of meat.
There are also chicken recipes that make it taste like lemon (because of the lemon ingredient), chicken recipes that make it spicy, or even sweet. These other ingredients give the chicken its taste.
Additions of seasonings, such as salt, pepper, garlic, fresh herbs, onion, and other vegan spices, just add flavor to this plant-based chicken meat.
What can you make with vegan chicken?
You can make many recipes with vegan chicken. You can even make vegan chicken burgers with it, nuggets, crunchy chicken fillet, spiced chicken roast, vegan chicken teriyaki, vegan buffalo chicken wings, and of course the ever-popular fried chicken but fried in vegan oil.
Is vegan chicken available in the marketplace?
As the vegan diet is now getting popular, meat substitute is also now easing slowly to the marketplace. From ground beef, ground pork to chicken meat there is an available variety for vegans in the supermarket. There are chicken-style nuggets, chicken breast, and wings, fillets, and chicken patties. Even the giant companies that used to offer real meat now markets the vegan chicken as they tried their limited run of Beyond Meat vegan chicken nuggets or boneless wings, the customer’s reaction has been exceptional.
Fry Family Foods
This company carries schnitzels and nuggets. Here, the schnitzel comprises celery root, or sometimes cabbage is added to the ingredients. Schnitzels are best cooked fried to attain its golden brown appearance.
Quorn
This company carries Cutlets, Spicy Chicken Patties, and Breaded Chicken Cutlets. A well known British company that specializes in vegetarian food products, using mushroom and vegan-friendly potatoes in their food mix.
Gardein
Vegan chicken meat that is available is Crispy Chicken Tenders, Teriyaki Strips, Sliders, BBQ Chicken Wings, Crispy Chicken Patties, 7-Grain Crispy Tenders, etc. This North American company is the second-largest manufacturer of meat-free products making its company quadrupled its sales over the last four years. This may also be because of the steady rising popularity of the vegan diet.
Beyond Meat
The plant-based chicken they carry contains soy and pea protein and salt, garlic, paprika, vegan seasonings, and other vegan spices. Beyond meat boasts of their vegan chicken strips that are almost realistically close to the actual chicken meat. They found this company in 2009 in Los Angeles and was since manufacturing plant-based food products. They continue to make and manufacture different plant-based meat up to this day.
Sunfed
The New-Zealand food company boast of vegan chicken that tastes like the real thing. They make vegan chicken meat out of yellow pea protein, rice bran oil, pumpkin, and fiber.
Morning Star Farms
This company now produces 100% plant-based buffalo wings, chicken nuggets, and buffalo chicken patties.
Some Restaurants are now carrying vegan meat in their menus. A&W Canada, KFC, TGIF, McDonald’s just to name some.
It is easy to take your pick of these goodies in the marketplace, you can also have the option of having vegan chicken that is raw or precooked. You can choose pre-cooked and have the ease of just heating the meat and adding up some other ingredients that you prefer like corn and carrots with some boiled potatoes. There is just no hassle with having a pre-cooked chicken because it will not take much of your time to prepare.
Another thing you can do is to make your vegan chicken just by mixing chickpeas, garlic powder, dried thyme, coriander powder, vegan chicken spice, nutritional yeast, onion powder, dried sage, dijon mustard, and lastly is vegan seasonings. Just put these ingredients inside the food processor with a bit of vegan chicken stock. After that, you can just get a big bowl or container where you can mix the processed ingredients with gluten powder or wheat gluten. Keep on mixing, kneading until it gets the right texture or firmness. Beware of over kneading it though or it will be tough and too chewy.
You need to flatten the kneaded mixture and cut to the size that you prefer. Cover with foil while steaming after. You may need to steam this for at least 20-30 minutes. You will have your homemade vegan chicken afterward. The cooked chicken can now be made to different chicken recipes. Like the one below.
Pan-seared chicken in butter (vegan) and lemon sauce.
Cut the chicken into small flat fillets, rub some vegan chicken spice into the fillets. Put some vegan butter into a skillet and then brown the fillets one by one. Remove from the skillet after browning every piece.
Add more vegan butter to the skillet, then put the slices of lemon in while squeezing some of it to mix with the butter. Add some salt to taste. Pour the mixture to the cooked chicken fillets. Serve hot.
There are also Southern Fried Vegetarian Chicken Nuggets, which is easy to make. Just buy preferred chicken nuggets in the marketplace as they have their different cuts to choose from, or you may just cut the meat portion to the size you like before frying, then after it is golden brown and cooked to perfection you can just serve with lettuce, vegan dip, and sauces.
Another mouth-watering vegan chicken dish is the Chinese Kung Pao- Vegan Chicken version. You just need to swap the tofu with vegan chicken to enjoy this dish. Everything is the same and the nuts, bell pepper, and the sauce, except tofu, were traded with chicken. Taste the same and still full of flavor.
Is vegan chicken healthy?
Since vegan chicken is made of plant-based products the meat will have less cholesterol and calories which will be beneficial to your health.
How much does a Vegan Diet cost?
The vegan chicken was said to be cheaper than its real meat contender. Manufacturers are deciding to lower their prices further so they can continue competing with meat companies. They are thinking of making it more affordable to the public so that the market will expand and prosper in the coming years. By having their followers grow in numbers and continue to increase, they can then produce more of the products and tap bigger opportunities for growth.
Companies are thinking of different ways to make the product more appealing to customers of different ages. They are deliberating about looking for less expensive ingredients they can use to produce the same quality vegan meat but at lower manufacturing prices.
What is a Vegan Diet?
Where a person consumes foods that are all plant-based there is no meat in the diet, not even fish or poultry. They also veer away from dairy and eggs as it is also an animal product. They eat only fruits, vegetables, whole grains, nuts, seeds, legumes, and leafy greens.
What are the benefits of going vegan?
Those people who are trying to lose weight are followers of this diet. Since there are fewer calories with the vegan diet they have lower body mass indexes. Others rely on their belief that having no meat in their diet will have a positive effect on their health.
Some people also find no problems with the meat equivalent when you go vegan as there are readily available meat substitutes in the marketplace e.g. chicken substitute. Vegan Chicken is the most sought after meat for vegans. They can still enjoy the same taste, texture without the guilt. Vegan chicken has less cholesterol and lesser calories when compared to real meat. Let us know more about vegan chicken.
