Chapter 874 752: Who Could Have Thought

Fu Yu listened to the chat between Xiaolin and Zhang Jingyu, pondering what ingredients could possibly replace pork.

At this moment, Xiaolin suddenly said to Zhang Jingyu, "Since this sweet and sour pork is tough to chew, maybe it'd be better to just change the dish. Back then, Sister Wang recommended sweet and sour fish fillets and sweet and sour prawn balls, but the old lady didn't want them, she just wanted sweet and sour pork."

"But if you make sweet and sour pork without pork, using some other ingredient, can you still call it sweet and sour pork? Only the ones made with meat can have that taste!"

Upon hearing this, Fu Yu immediately turned to look over.

It only works if it's made with meat?

But what if there's something that can replace meat, and it's even softer in texture than meat...

Seitan!

If there's a material that can substitute meat, it must be seitan.

Fu Yu had previously made vegetarian meals and knew that if seitan was made into a stir-fried dish, it tasted remarkably like real meat in texture.

If seitan is made into slices, coated, and fried, it can probably resemble the real deal quite well, and it would definitely be easier to chew than real meat slices.

With this in mind, Fu Yu said to Zhang Jingyu, "Go get me some flour."

Seitan is made by adding an appropriate amount of water to flour, adding a pinch of salt, kneading it into a dough, then repeatedly washing it in clear water to remove the starch and other impurities, and finally cooking the washed gluten.

At this time, Zhao Meng had a dish ready, and Xiaolin took it and walked away with it.

Zhang Jingyu quickly brought over some flour for Fu Yu as he was instructed.

Fu Yu put the flour in a bowl, added some water and a bit of salt to it, then poured it into the flour and mixed thoroughly.

As Fu Yu was kneading the dough, Sun Mingze, who had just finished frying a batch of potato cubes, turned to watch Fu Yu knead the dough and curiously asked, "Chef Fu, if you're replacing the ingredient in sweet and sour pork, can't you use tofu? Tofu is so soft, coating it to make sweet and sour pork should make it crispy and tender, right?"

Fu Yu looked at Sun Mingze and couldn't help but shake his head, "Tofu won't work, its flavor is too heavy, even if coated and made sweet and sour, it still has a beany taste. And the texture is quite different!"

An intern who joined at the same time as Sun Mingze was carrying over a large bowl of chopped potatoes and, hearing Sun Mingze talking to Fu Yu, intentionally slowed down to listen to their conversation.

After hearing Fu Yu's response, the male student couldn't help but purse his lips.

Fu Yu turned around and continued kneading the dough.

The male student glanced at Sun Mingze with a smile and sidled over, whispering, "I find Chef Fu to be rather pretentious! Making a mystery out of it, it's not that exaggerated! Remember when the teacher said back in school that sweet and sour fish fillets could actually be made with tofu?"

"If tofu didn't taste good fried, why is there a dish called sweet and sour tofu?"

Although Sun Mingze knew the male student had no idea about the context and what he said didn't make sense, he didn't argue.

He continued to obediently finish the frying, but his attention was still mostly on Fu Yu, curious to see what Fu Yu would use to replace pork for that sweet and sour pork dish.

The male student wasn't upset that Sun Mingze didn't respond; he just looked at Fu Yu and shook his head, "Heh... what's the big deal, it's only a matter of graduating two years earlier, what's with the mystery? Cooking is cooking, there's nothing so mysterious about it!"

The flour quickly formed into a sticky dough.

The formed dough needed resting time.

Fu Yu took this time to quickly cook two other dishes.

Once the dough had rested enough, he placed it in a sieve and rinsed it with water to wash away all the surface starch.

In no time, what was left in the sieve was a sticky mass of washed gluten.

The more times you wash it, the less starch is left in the gluten, increasing the protein content, which means better quality.

Fu Yu washed it five times before he was satisfied.

The next step was to steam it. Normally, you would cut it into small pieces or form it into small balls for steaming.

But since this seitan was to replace pork, Fu Yu cut it into slices directly.

It's quite a challenging task. After steaming, seitan expands, so it's tricky to cut it to the right thickness all at once.

Fu Yu intentionally cut it a bit thick; once it's steamed, he can cut it to the final size.

In fact, many people don't realize that the meat in vegetarian dishes is usually mimicked using soy products.

For instance, vegetarian braised pork uses potatoes, but truly the most meat-like ingredient is seitan, especially when used for stir-fried dishes in Peking sauce, it's almost indistinguishable from the real thing.

The texture, especially, is very meat-like when chewed.

Before making this dish, Fu Yu felt a bit unsure, but once he began, he stopped overthinking it.

All he could focus on was how to make the seitan imitate meat's flavor and texture.

Fu Yu never timed the steaming; he relied on his own sense of timing to judge how long to steam it.

But that's because he was confident in his skills, and on the surface, he continued to direct Zhang Jinyu as needed.

After all, others didn't know the extent of his skills.

Fu Yu said to Zhang Jinyu, "Jin Yu, keep an eye on the pot for me; don't let it steam too long. Also, get me some shredded carrot and ginger, and a bit of shredded green onion."