Vegan Buffalo Chicken Sandwich with Celery Slaw

Way back when I was not vegan, a buffalo chicken sandwich was my go-to take out order.

I like spicy food and my husband is not really a fan. So when it was just the two of us, I never cooked anything with buffalo sauce because he wasn’t going to eat it.

But eventually we had kids, and a few of those kids have grown up to love buffalo everything just like me! Glory glory hallelujah!! Now I can finally justify a buffalo sauce themed dinner!!

My all time favorite buffalo chicken sandwich was at a place in Jax called, Chomp Chomp. If you live in Jax or have visited and ever eaten there, then you know! They sadly closed last year and broke many a locals heart.

Their buffalo sandwich was a perfectly crispy chicken sandwich, extra hot, extra drippy, slathered in celery slaw and blue cheese. CELERY SLAW, Y’ALL. Blue cheese celery slaw!!!!

I mean its been a long time ago that I ate that sandwich, and went back to a vegetarian diet pretty soon after I did eat it (they did offer a vegetarian version.) I had a bit of a slippery relationship with being vegetarian for some years due to being pregnant and at the time and being made to feel like I needed to eat meat and was not getting enough protein.

Ahh the age old “but how are you getting enough protein?” question. Did you know that the super firm tofu I use to make this vegan chicken is actually high protein! 14 grams per serving, actually. Cleary I now see that was all a load of garbage. Live and learn. The more you know and all that jazz…..moving on.

Fast forward to being vegetarian then vegan, and my order eventually changed, but even their vegan eats were delicious. But, I never got over missing that perfect buffalo chicken sandwich.

So, in honor of the closing of one Jacksonville’s best down town eateries, I have decided to recreate the Chomp Chomp Buffalo sandwich and make it VEGAN, full of protein for all the haters, extra spicy, and dripping with a pile of homemade vegan blue cheese slaw, and extra vegan blue cheese.

Don’t be intimidated by making your own vegan fried chicken. It is actually really easy. I have linked the recipe to our southern fried chicken for this sandwich. I am always preaching how easy seitan making is, and really y’all, its so easy. It mixes up in minutes, bakes in a little over half an hour, and fries up extra fast.

The catch its seitan has to rest to get it to meaty texture we all want. If you try and eat it right away it can be spongy and not great. Just let it rest! LET THE BREAST REST!

Seitan also freezes really well so if you are making a sandwich for one, two, four, six, whatever, you get 8 vegan chicken pieces from this recipe. They will actually freeze beautifully for up to 6 months. You can make all kinds of things out of one batch of vegan chicken breast. You don’t have fry them. You can thaw leftovers and use them in stir fry, make vegan chicken salad from them, use them in any dish you would need a vegan chicken for!!

The point I am trying to make is that the effort and time involved in making a batch of this seitan is 100% worth it! And once you make it, you can make one of the most delicious vegan buffalo chickens sandwiches ever!

Thanks again for the inspiration Chomp Chomp, you are missed. Please, please, make a come back..and if you do, give me call, I’ll be happy to help with some vegan offerings ;)

*This recipe will yield up to 8 chicken sandwiches. If you do not need 8, you can freeze any leftover chicken breast for later use, for up to 6 months. You can store any leftovers in the fridge for up to 10 days in an airtight container.

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 batch vegan southern fried chicken (you do not need to add the rice paper skin)

• 1 batch vegan blue cheese dressing

• Vegan hamburger buns (we used Dave’s new Killer Hamburger Buns)

• 6-7 stalks of celery

• 2/3 cups matchstick carrots

• salt and pepper to taste

• 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

• 1/2-1 cup Franks Buffalo Sauce (depending on how many sandwiches you are making)

• 1-2 teaspoons vegan buttter

• 1 teaspoon garlic salt

• extra hot sauce if you want the sandwich EXTRA spicy

INSTRUCTIONS:

1. Prepare the chicken according to the recipe. The chicken is made from seitan and needs to rest in the fridge before frying. It will need to be made the day before or at least 6 hours before frying. For this recipe I did not add the rice paper skin. Just form the “chicken” breast and bake. Then LET THEM REST!!

2. Prepare the vegan blue cheese according to the directions. You could also use store bought.

3. To prepare the slaw, cut the celery stalks length wise and as thinly as you can get them. Like thin matchsticks. Then cut them into quarters the other way. Toss the celery and the carrot match sticks into a blender or food processor and pulse a few times to chop it all up. If you do not have a blender or food processor you can try to finely chop the slaw by hand. You just want a slaw consistency. If you are making only a few sandwiches, you can easily half this recipe.

4. Add the celery and carrots to a bowl and mix with the vinegar, 2-3 tablespoons of vegan blue cheese dressing, and salt and pepper to taste.

5. In a medium size microwave safe bowl, heat the Franks hot sauce and butter for 1 and half to 2 minutes. You just need the Franks heated through and the butter melted. Mix in the garlic salt and dip each vegan fried chicken breast into the sauce to coat fully.

6. Smear some vegan blue cheese dressing on the top and bottom bun, add a coated piece of vegan fried chicken, and top with a generous portion of celery slaw to serve. (also is suggest a pile of napkins!)

If you like this recipe, then try these:

Vegan Buffalo Chicken Stuffed Challah

Vegan Fried Chicken and Waffles

Vegan Parmesan Chicken Sandwich

Vegan Southern Fried Chicken

My mom can fry the heck out of some chicken. Pre-vegan, pre-vegetarian, fried chicken was my favorite food.

We are from the south, my parents are from Alabama, so frying foods is something you are basically born doing. My mom taught me young.

I have tried all sorts of vegan fried chicken variations over the years, using tofu, and basic seitan. I have seen people using jackfruit to mimic the shredded texture. But I decide to take my turkey seitan recipe, change a few things and fry that up.

It is by far the most convincing vegan meat recipe I have made to date, and surely it would work well for a vegan fried chicken. And it did!

The basic recipe for this chicken is pretty similar to the turkey, with some changes to certain spices, and the addition of adding rice paper skin when baking to add another element of crunch to the whole thing.

I am always preaching about letting setian rest, and it does need to rest. I did find this recipe did well when I baked it in morning and fried it that night. The pieces are thin enough that a 6 hour rest seem sufficient. I do think it would have been even better if I gave it overnight but 6 hours works.

I like to add the coating to a large zip lock bag, although you can use a clean brown grocery bag as well. It just makes for less mess when getting the pieces coated. I also like to double coat them so they are good and crispy. Thats what you want, a nice crispy “skin". You can also cut the pieces once they have rested and make chicken fingers pretty easily.

I have not tried this recipe in the air fryer. It should work just fine, it just won’t be nearly as goo. If you give the pieces a spray with oil, I think you could cook them on 375 for 10 minutes but check on them to see how they are doing. I have reheated the pan fried pieces in the air fryer and that works great.

So if you are looking for a crispy, flavorful, vegan fried chicken, this is my favorite, and now my go to recipe! My only other suggestion is be sure you also bake up a batch of fluffy southern biscuits when you deiced to make this recipe. Every southerner knows you can’t have one without the other.

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 block super firm tofu (the kind that is vacuum packed with little liquid)

• 1 cup vital wheat gluten

• 1/4 cup nutritional yeast

• 2 tablespoons tapioca or corn starch

• 2 teaspoons poultry or Trader Joes Vegan Chicken Seasoning

• 1 teaspoon garlic powder

• 1 teaspoons onion salt

• 2 teaspoons No Chicken Better Than Bouillon

• 2 teaspoons liquid smoke

• 1/2- 3/4 cups water

RICE PAPER SKIN:

• 10 pieces of rice paper, summer roll wrappers

• 1/2 cup warm water

• 1 teaspoon Better Than Bouillon

• 1 teaspoon vegan chicken seasoning or poultry seasoning

COATING:

• 1/2 cup plain unsweetened vegan yogurt

• 1 cup milk

• 2 1/2 cups all purpose flour

• 1/2 cup tapioca or corn starch

• 2 teaspoons each, garlic powder, dried thyme, salt, onion powder, sugar

• 1 teaspoon each turmeric, cinnamon, black pepper, smoked paprika

• 1/4- 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

INSTRUCTIONS:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

MAKING THE SEITAN CHICKEN BREAST:

*If you attempt this recipe with REGULAR EXTRA FIRM TOFU you will need to press it well, and reduce the water added to the recipe. Add the water last only a tablespoon at time until the dough resembles the picture. This will cause varying results and I really do suggest finding the super firm, vacuum sealed, high protein tofu if you can. It gives the seitan a far better texture.

1. Break up the tofu and place it into a food processor with the regular metal blade. Run the processor for around a minute until the tofu is broken down.

2. Add all of the remaining ingredients and let the food processor run for a couple of minutes. You want the mixture to form a dough. Letting the processor run will help knead the dough. We want this seitan to be firm so we need it to knead for a bit. If you dough seems a bit too dry, you can add another few tablespoons of water, just don’t add too much more! I start at 1/2 cup and work from there.

3. Once you have a smooth but firm dough, remove it from the food processor and place on a clean counter. Knead the dough with your hands for about a minute, forming a kind of oval, flattened out shaped with the dough. Cut the dough into 10 triangles. Using your hands, form the triangles into a chicken breast shape.

4. In a shallow dish or pie plate, add the warm water, bouillon and seasoning for the rice papers. Stir well until the bouillon is mixed in. Place one rice paper at a time in the mix until it is super soft and pliable. Lay the rice paper flat on a cutting board. Place one piece of chicken seitan in the middle and wrap the rice paper skin around the seitan. Repeat with process with remaining rice paper and seitan pieces.

5. Line a baking sheet in parchment paper or foil, spray with oil. Evenly space out the seitan chicken pieces making sure they are not touching. They will expand as they bake. Spray the tops with oil and tightly cover the entire pan in foil, tucking the edges tightly around the edges of the pan. We want the seitan to steam inside the pan. Place the pan on the middle rack of the oven and bake for 20 minutes.

6. Open up the foil and allow the seitan chicken to bake for another 20 minutes uncovered. These chicken seitan pieces are thin, if you know your oven cooks hot or the temp is off, you may need to adjust your cook time by 5-10 minutes. If the seitan over cooks it tends to form tiny holes that look like bread. That is often an indication you oven temp is off and you may need a oven thermometer to check the actual temp.

7. Let the seitan cool at room temp them transfer to the fridge for at least 6 hours to rest. I often bake the seitan the night before I wish to fry it. But you could also bake it in the morning and it would be fine to fry by dinner. Seitan requires a nice long rest to firm up and achieve a more meaty texture. The longer you can let it rest, the better!

FRYING THE SEITAN CHICKEN BREAST:

If you want chicken fingers, you can slice the chicken breast into 3 pieces now that it has rested.

1. In a medium bowl or pie plate, whisk the plant milk and yogurt together.

2. In a large zip lock bag combine the flour, starch, and spices. Shake it up really well to get it all mixed together

3. Take a piece or seitan chicken breast and first dip it in the milk mixture, next shake it in the bag of flour, shake off any excess flour and dip it in the milk again, then back in the bag for another shake. Place on a plate and repeat with remaining pieces.

4. Place a wire cooling rack onto of a paper towel lined baking sheet. This is where the fried seitan chicken will go once its cooked. This helps it stay crispier than if you just placed it on a paper towel lined plate. This method works for all fried foods.

5. Heat a large, deep skillet with 2-3 inches of neutral flavored oil good for frying like canola or peanut, over medium heat. You will know the oil is hot enough if you place a chopstick or wooden skewer in the bottom of the pan and little bubbles form around the tip.

6. Place 3 or 4 pieces of seitan chicken in the pan, careful not to over crowd and let it fry on each side until golden brown. Place the finish pieces on the cooling rack. Fry remaining pieces.

7. Serve with southern vegan biscuits, mashed potatoes, or whatever side you like.

If you like this recipe, then try these:

Vegan Seitan Ribs

Popcorn Tofu

Fluffy Southern Vegan Biscuits