TVP, or textured vegetable protein, is often misunderstood, and equally often dismissed as "highly processed", but actually is a great source of protein, as well as a decent replacement for meat in many recipes.
So, what is this ingredient? Quite simply, it is mostly just flour (usually soy or pea) and water, kneaded and cooked, and then pushed under pressure through a die. The resulting block, which has protein strands aligned along its length by the process, can then be cut into different shapes and then dried.
Sounds pretty processed alright, but actually it is pretty much the same process that makes dried pasta from semolina flour. The machinery is quite similar. And, like pasta, you can also make your own at home from soy flour.
TVP doesn't have quite the same set of shapes available as pasta, although more and more are coming on the market all the time, and typically comes in nugget, chunk, strips and a ground version that works well as a beef mince replacement.
In Ireland it is not as widely available as I would like, but it can be bought from Holland & Barret, store or online, as well as AsiaMarket.ie.
As a dried product, it needs some reconstitution before use, which is often just soaking it in hot water for 30 minutes or so. In fact, for a wet dish such as a ragu, the mince product can just be added dry to the sauce as it is cooking.
From a flavour point of view it has a very mild, nutty taste, but will take on the flavour of what it is cooked in. If it is going to be more of a star in the dish, you can reconstitute it with a flavoured liquid, such as a veggie stock.
If I am going to make a beef-type dish, I like to use OXO's Meat Free stock cubes. Something like Better Than Bouillon would work well too. If you can get those, some Marmite with some soy sauce, garlic powder and onion powder can make a good stock to use.
40g-50g of TVP (40g in image above) would be about a US cup full, and would serve two people as part of a sauce. One OXO cube will make about 200ml of stock, and that will be plenty to rehydrate this amount of TVP. Usually needs no more than 30 minutes. I like to stir a couple of times during the rehydration, just to make sure all the chunks are evenly covered.
Once reconstituted, the chunks are quite spongy and will still have a lot of stock in them. This may not be too much of a problem if qoing into a stew or ragu, just give them a quick squeeze before adding to the pot. Otherwise it is better for their texture and how they cook if you squeeze as much of the liquid out.
One good tip, which I picked up from the SauceStache YouTube channel, is to use a tofu press and the leave in the fridge for a couple of hours. This actually does a great job! If you don't have one, squeeze in a clean tea towel, and you could leave that squeezed ball in a collander with a weight on it for a while.
Once properly squeezed, the TVP chunks will behave quite like chunks of meat. They will brown very nicely in a pan or under the grill.
Now, pour in some sciracha, throw some of your favourite shredded cheese onto the chunks in the pan, toast a couple of slices of bread, add a good portion of vegan mayo on one and yellow mustard on the other, and enjoy a vegan cheesesteak sandwich!
There is so much that you can do with TVP, from burgers to nuggets to mince, and it is so easy to use! Enjoy!
Update:
Just an update on another way of doing this sandwich.
I sautéed some mushrooms in a pan with a little oil, a good pinch of salt and a quarter teaspoon of garlic powder. Once they had released most of their water and had started to caramelise nicely, I reserved them in a bowl and then added the TVP to the pan with some more oil, more salt and a little more garlic powder.
Once the TVP chunks were crispy, I added the mushrooms back into the pan along with a couple of handfuls of Nurishh plant-based cheddar and mozzarella shreds. Stirred around for a minute then onto the sandwich.
Delish!
