BBQ Seitan "Ribz" Complete with "Bonz"!

I don't think it's any secret that I'm a veg*n who used to be a hard-core meat lover, until I came to the conclusion that killing animals for food was just wrong on so many levels. But my comittment to go veg didn't eliminate overnight my craving for meaty things.


I found myself one humming one morning this week while making breakfast...I had that Chili's "BabyBack Ribs" jingle running through my head, and I got to thinking about how good a big feed of BBQ "ribz" would be.

Now, I've tried different recipes for vegan ribz, using seitan, and tempeh, and tofu. They were all OK, but there was something about the experience that was lacking:

The Bones.

OK, I know that the concept of gnawing on bones probably nauseates quite a few of you fine readers out there, and at this point, I can certainly understand why! But there was something a little festive about cooking up a rack o' ribs, and I missed that.





So I got to talking about it with hubby Bob, and he said he could help me out. I may be a little biased, but that man can do anything, including making me some "bonz" for my "ribz".





He made them using food-ready cedar planks, sold at the grocery store and generally used for "planking" salmon. He cut them up, shaped them like ribs, and sanded them smooth.

Before cooking, I soaked them over night in a mixture of water, beefy vegan bouillon, and liquid smoke.

I made up a batch of seitan, trying to approximate a rib flavour to the best of my memory. (It's been a while, but I think I did pretty well!!)

After letting the seitan rest for an hour, I rolled it out thinly and made four long strips, two strips per "rack". I added the "bonz" at regular intervals.

I covered the two "racks" with another layer of foil, and then placed another cookie sheet on top of them, with something heavy on top of that for another half-hour. (I wanted the two seitan layers to "meld together."

I then wrapped them in foil and baked at 3o0 degrees for two hours.

Here is what they looked like when they came out of the oven:

After cooling, I made up a batch of my grandma's famous barbecue sauce, and let them sit in the hot sauce on the counter for an hour. (My Grandma's sauce starts off very thin, but thickens considerably while it cooks. It makes a great marinade before cooking!) My Grandma was incredibly eccentric, but she sure had great sauce.

Two hours before supper, I put the ribz and sauce in the oven at 250 covered in foil. Here is what they looked like after an hour...(I flipped them a few times while cooking..)

And after cooking on 350 f0r 30 minutes with the foil off....

MAN OH MAN, did the house ever smell good while all this was going on!!

Now you can't have ribs without all the fixin's that go along with them....corn on the cob, homemade crockpot baked beans, and some boiled potatoes with margarine.

These ribs were stupendous! I haven't had anything this realistic in a year and a half. They were spicy, and messy, and saucy, and perfect. If I could do it over again, I wouldn't change a thing. You could even hold the ribs in both hands and gnaw the "meat" off the bonz.

I'm so full right now it's a wonder I can type.

I think the cat has the same problem, even though he skipped the ribz...Courtney tried to change her bed today, but the cat seemed to take a shine to the hot sheets right from the dryer...needless to say, she waited an hour to make the bed. (She didn't have the heart to move him!)

Hope you all had a restful weekend, because the grind starts again tomorrow!

Peace and BBQ!