We are obsessed with protein.

The question is, do we need as much as we think we need, and do we need to get it from animals?

Hint, cows eat grass and get to be 1,500 pounds of muscle.

(mooing) We'll talk plant proteins and how to cook them deliciously as we go back to the cutting board today on Christina Cooks.

(uplifting music) ♪ (announcer) Underwriting for Christina Cooks is provided by Suzanne's Specialties, offering a full line of alternative vegan and organic sweeteners and toppings.

Suzanne's Specialties, sweetness the way Mother Nature intended.

Additional funding is also provided by Old Yankee Cutting Boards, designed for durability and custom crafted by hand with Yankee pride and craftsmanship.

♪ Jonathan's Spoons, individually handcrafted from cherry wood, each designed with your hand and purpose in mind.

♪ Additional funding is also provided by: Hi, I'm Christina Pirello, and this is Christina Cooks, where each week we take fresh, seasonal ingredients and whip them into amazing dishes.

Will they all be plant-based?

Yup.

Will they be delicious?

Absolutely.

Now, I don't know about you, but I am a committed gym rat.

I love training, I love building muscle, I love all of that.

But I go to the gym with a lot of, um, muscle heads, shall we say, who eat the Keto diet, the Paleo diet, and they eat all this saturated fat in the hope of building their muscles because they have to get enough protein.

Well, here's a news flash.

There's protein in everything you eat except fruit.

And, remember, cows eat grass.

So, these are plant proteins that we'll be using today that will give you everything you need when it comes to building strength and being big and strong in your life.

You can be a plant-based Superman.

So, the first recipe involves lots of veggies and a plant protein called seitan or wheat gluten.

You've heard it called both things probably.

Wheat meat.

It's pure, unadulterated gluten.

And I know everyone has a phobia of gluten, heaven forbid, but gluten is actually a protein and that's why it's hard to digest, so unless you have celiac, which is one percent of the population, a gluten hardship, like you'd have a hard time digesting it is because it's a protein, and all proteins are hard to digest.

So if you don't have celiac, get over it.

So, what we're gonna do is start with our veg.

And what I have here is boiling water that I'm gonna salt lightly, and what the salt does in the boiling water is help the veggies to hold on to their flavor.

So, the first thing that goes in is frozen or fresh corn.

Now if your corn is really fresh, like it got picked from the farm that morning, you probably don't even need to blanch it, but we're gonna.

We're gonna take it out, like it's in and out.

Blanching is in and out.

Boiling is it stays in for a while.

And the fun part of this recipe is figuring out how to get all the little corn kernels out of the water.

So, it just becomes part of the joy of cooking.

And if some stay in here, that's okay, they'll come out with the rest of the veggies.

Next go in carrot matchsticks, and you want to cut your carrots really finely like this into a fine julienne because that's gonna help them to cook quickly, and we don't want them soft and mushy, or as we say in Italian, mushade.

What we want is them to be a little bit crunchy, but not raw because raw is harder to digest, and we want this to be easy because there is gonna be a protein in this dish.

And when a dish has protein, it becomes harder to digest, so we want to make it as easy as possible.

The next thing to get blanched is snow peas.

And when you're boiling or blanching veggies, you want to keep them in a certain order.

The most benign or mild-tasting to the strongest so that each veggie keeps its character.

So as soon as the snow peas are bright green, they come out.

So far this dish is, you know, you can't break a sweat.

And in the bowl, by the way, I have cooked soba noodles which are buckwheat noodles.

You can use whatever kind of noodles you like.

You can use regular spaghetti, whole wheat spaghetti, or you can use soba noodles.

I like them because they cook really quickly and they hold up well.

So the broccoli just until it's bright green.

Raw broccoli is really hard to digest, and you can cook it longer if you have digestive issues or you don't want it quite so crunchy.

In our house, we like the broccoli just below raw.

And the final thing to go into our blanching process are fresh shiitake mushrooms.

And similar to dried shiitake mushrooms, what fresh shiitake do is help you to digest better.

So adding them to a dish that has protein and oil will help you to digest a little more easily.

So they come out.

Now if these were dried shiitake, they would take a lot longer to cook, so I use the fresh.

Then, we're gonna take our pan and set it over here and take some broth... into a smaller pan to make a glaze.

And all this is gonna do is have a little bit of flavor from the veggie broth.

And you don't need much.

It's just gonna be a tiny glaze.

Okay, now, we're gonna add a little soy sauce to that... ...so it has some flavor.

And then we're gonna turn on the heat.

And in this pan we have avocado oil.

What I'm gonna do is bread and fry some seitan which is gonna be our protein.

The other thing I have happening right here now is I have some pears that we sliced and they're soaked in water that has some lemon juice, and that's gonna help them from browning, and that's gonna give us a little bit of fresh crunch to our, um, dish.

So, sesame seeds into our flour.

This is whole wheat sprouted flour.

I use it for almost everything because it's so easy to digest.

It digests like a vegetable instead of a grain.

A little bit of salt to give it flavor.

Now the oil is gonna get hot pretty fast and it is a high-heat oil.

So now we'll take pieces of seitan.

This is seitan.

Seitan is not the most beautiful thing in its raw state, but it's a really good source of protein and it gives you something, like a heartier texture.

You know, a lot of people say that, you know, vegan food or plant-based food doesn't have any flavor.

Well, seitan--or it doesn't have good texture.

Some people don't like tofu because it tastes like Jell-O, but seitan has that good sort of meaty texture.

And if you cook it right, it tastes really good.

If you don't cook it right, it tastes like wet bread because it actually does come from wheat.

It's pure wheat gluten.

So that goes into the oil.

I'm gonna let that sort of come to a simmer while we make our sauce.

Okay?

Good.

Then... Now we have our veg, and now we're gonna take some cold water and dissolve-- you may use arrowroot or kuzu.

I don't use a lot of cornstarch because cornstarch is really acidic in the intestines, so I use arrowroot or kuzu.

And kuzu is the most alkalizing to the intestines, but anything will work.

Kuzu is a little expensive for people, so use, um, arrowroot if you like.

And then you're just gonna stir this until it thickens and turns clear, which happens pretty quick.

And then this goes right on top of your veg.

It's a nice, thick glaze.

Now, before we mix the glaze in, we go back into our oil and turn this.

You're just gonna turn this once.

This is what's called a shallow-fry.

Right, if you have to turn it only one time, it's a shallow-fry.

If you want to deep-fry it, then, you know.

Deep-fried protein is not exactly an ideal thing, but this is just gonna give it a nice texture and richness.

So now we'll come back over here... ...mix our noodles with our veg.

You can season this however you want if you want to add more ginger or whatever.

Then I'll take some tongs because long noodles really like tongs for serving.

And right into a serving bowl.

(faint sizzling) And if you like, if you really want a different sort of like a fresher flavor, you can add some lemon juice to your sauce.

I do it sometimes.

Sometimes I don't.

I have to be honest with ya.

It's sort of like one of those things if I remember, I do it; if I don't, I don't.

And, then, the seitan comes out and goes on top of our noodles.

And you can see it's not a ton of protein here.

It's just a little bit in comparison to the other things.

Then we'll take some of our pears to give us a nice, fresh, crunchy texture on the side.

And then you'll mix this in as you eat it.

I garnish it with a little bit of scallion.

And you have sort of a one-pot, really delicious dish.

♪ -Can a vegetable be a fruit?

-A fruit can be a vegetable.

What?

It can be both?

What happens if you swallow the seeds?

(unintelligible).

-I don't get it.

-I am so confused.

♪ (Christina) I can't tell you guys the number of phone calls, e-mails, and letters we get to the office asking us all sorts of questions about, uh, food, how to get your feet on the path to wellness.

So, I have people coming in to ask questions, but every now and then, I bring in an expert to talk about something that you guys have all asked me about.

So, today, I'm with Anthony Molino, who happens to be my trainer.

He's a personal trainer, Assistant Director of Nutrition at Methodist Hospital in Philadelphia, and the founder of Food Fitness.

-Hey, how are ya?

-Good.

(Christina) We're not training, it's amazing.

-Right?

-So I know you hear this a lot, particularly from your female clients, I'm sure.

They don't like to lift a lot, I was one of 'em.

You don't like to lift a lot 'cause you're gonna get big and bulky.

But what is it, even when we're training, what is it that makes us fat?

Is it oil?

Is it--like, what is it that does that?

-It's not lifting, right?

-It's not lifting.

The basic formula is if you're taking in more calories than you're able to expend.

And body genetics has an impact as well if you're gonna put on, you know, 'cause if your body is not able to expend those calories, it's gonna store them for future use in the form of body fat.

So, yes, some people do have a tendency to get bulker--bulkier.

It depends on their genetic set point, but the lifting in itself is not.

You're not producing enough estrogen.

I'm not producing, at my age, enough testosterone to create all that bulk.

It's more gonna be about the food that you're putting in your body.

So I don't need to lift, like, or any woman needs to lift like only a little three-pounder so they don't get bulky.

You can lift 15 and still not get too huge.

Yes.

I totally agree with that.

(Christina) So, then, should we be eating added fats?

Like, do we need them, especially when we're training?

I do, you--the healthy fats like avocado, chickpeas, they help with brain function, and I believe that in itself will give you clarity, it will give you a lot of important things, but most important, those healthy fats are the vehicle that help move the carbohydrates and the protein to the right pl-- (Christina) So then you're not of the opinion that people should give up added oil?

(Anthony) No, not at all.

Just in moderation.

-It depends on... -Yeah, not onion rings.

Exactly.

You know, if you're eating the healthier fats, like the avocados, like your nuts and seeds, -like the, you know... -Good olive oil.

(Anthony) Exactly, good olive oil is, you know, is a great healthy fat, and it's gonna also be great for your HDLs, your good cholesterol, so that in itself isn't going to be, you know, harmful.

(Christina) Okay.

Phew!

Okay, we don't have to give up oil and it won't make us fat.

♪ All right, so now we're gonna work with the dreaded tofu.

Now before you run from the room screaming because of all the things you've heard about tofu, it makes men grow breasts, it shrinks babies' brains, kills your libido, and gives women breast cancer, let's clear all that right up.

That happens because of hormones, all of those things.

There's no hormones in a little tiny soybean, so tofu is fine to eat.

Relax.

Okay?

So the first thing we're gonna do is make a scallion pancake 'cause it's gonna be the base of this dish.

And so in this bowl I have whole wheat sprouted flour, baking powder, and salt.

I'm gonna add to it some finely chopped scallions, hence the name scallion pancakes, some avocado oil... ...to be the fat.

And I'm doing that because I'm seasoning with soy sauce and I want a mild-tasting oil for everything else so that the soy sauce and the hot spice can shine through.

And you're gonna mix this till you have, like, the texture of wet sand.

Then, you're gonna add water a little at a time until you have sort of like a crepe pancake batter, and that's gonna be the texture that you want.

And if you make it a tiny bit too thin, don't panic.

You're gonna set this aside, and because it's whole grain flour-- because we all use whole grain flour, right?

This is gonna thicken ever so slightly as you set it aside.

And you want to mix it just till it's done mixing.

There is gluten in this flour, so the more you mix, the more you break the threads of the gluten and the thicker and tougher it'll get.

So once it's mixed, stop.

Okay?

So we're gonna set that aside over here.

And then we're gonna work on our black bean sauce.

And the black bean sauce has some avocado oil as the base.

If you start with one oil in a recipe, you want to kind of carry it through so the flavors are, you know, all the same.

Monogamous, if you will.

We're gonna add to this some red onion.

Turn your heat on.

Add some red onion.

I like red onion, but you may use whatever you like.

Some jalapeno.

Your choice.

As much or as little as floats your boat.

We like spicy things in our house, but if you don't like it so spicy, don't.

Some corn because the organic corn is gonna give it a really lovely texture.

Some finely diced winter squash, or in the summer you can use zucchini, whatever you like.

Some hot spice.

Just like some red chili flakes or, you know, whatever you like for hot spice.

And, then, we'll stir.

We're gonna add a tiny pinch of salt.

Even though we're gonna season this with soy sauce, we're gonna add a tiny pinch of salt to start to develop the flavors in the sauté.

Then we're gonna take some black beans.

These are black.

Black beans are often called "black turtle beans," but it's black beans.

And I cook them, and now we mash them with a fork so that you get about half of them mashed so it's sort of crumbly but not whole beans.

If you want to use the whole beans, go ahead, but you'll get a creamier sauce if you partly mix them and mash them.

So we're gonna add those in.

Then... ...a little bit of water.

Don't get carried away with water on this.

You're not making soup.

A little water.

Some soy sauce 'cause the beans are cooked, so I don't have to worry about them being hard by adding soy sauce too early.

Give them a stir.

And we're gonna let them simmer without a lid.

Right, I want these without a lid so that they can sort of thicken into their own sort of sauce.

Okay.

Now we're gonna fry some tofu.

Tofu has a very... benign quality, shall we say?

And, so, most people don't like it.

They don't like it because they've had it badly cooked or not cooked at all, or they don't like the texture.

So, I usually fry it when I cook it.

And as my mother used to say, "You could fry woodchips and people would like it."

So if it's your first foray into cooking tofu, try pan-frying it.

And you want to start with your oil not super hot, right, because you'll put the tofu in, it'll splatter all over.

It'll be a mess, and you'll think, "I'm never doing this again."

So we're gonna let that sort of build, let the sizzle build.

And while that's happening, there's a lot going on with this dish, but it's actually pretty easy, we'll start our scallion pancakes.

And what I have is a cast iron skillet that's been well-seasoned with oil.

Right, so you want to make sure when you use a cast iron skillet that you don't wash them with soap.

You want to keep that lovely seasoning that's on there.

You just rinse them with water.

So we're gonna make one good-size pancake, and you want to leave it cooking until the edges bubble and they start to brown and then you'll know.

So now we're gonna come back to our tofu and we're gonna flip it.

Slippery little suckers, but we're gonna flip it.

(sizzling) Sometimes it sticks, sometimes it behaves.

And sometimes it doesn't.

So we'll let the other side fry, stir our black bean sauce, and check our scallion pancake.

So you see it's just starting to get firm around the edge here.

So we're gonna let that cook, and as soon as it's ready to flip, we'll flip it.

♪ Okay.

So then you're gonna flip it and let the other side cook.

Now these can cook pretty quickly if your flame is high, or they can take a couple minutes either side, so you have to kind of judge, right, with your skillet.

So then to plate this, we're gonna take our scallion pancake, put it on the dish... kind of in the center.

That's your base.

Then, we'll take some black bean sauce and ladle it over the scallion pancake.

You kind of, you know, can be as cheffy as you want with this or not.

Then we'll take our fried tofu.

This is a really high-protein dish.

You know, and if you're athletic or very active or you stand on your feet a lot during the day, this is the kind of dish you want to make 'cause you've got tofu, you've got beans, and you've got complex carbohydrates to give you strength.

And then we garnish with a few fresh scallions.

And this is an incredibly protein-packed main course.

♪ You think protein is confusing?

Have you looked at salt lately?

There's every kind of salt under the sun.

There's entire salt sections in supermarkets.

It's overwhelming.

We have truffle salt, infused salt, habanero salt.

We have smoked salts, we have black salts, green salts, gray salts, salt samplers.

What's a girl to do?

Take a deep breath and simplify.

In my house there are two salts.

I have a white everyday sea salt that I use almost every day, and you know it's unrefined 'cause there's little clumps in it, so you know there's no stabilizers.

And the other one is a pink Himalayan salt.

I happen to like the flaked one, but you can use fine or coarse grind.

What's nice about these is they have the perfect mineral concentration for your bloodstream and to make your food taste satisfying and sweet without being too salty.

So keep it simple and just have two salts.

♪ So, last dish.

If the first two dishes were too much work for you, wait till you see how easy this one is.

This is tempeh.

Tempeh comes to us from Indonesia.

It's fermented soy product.

It has a bit heartier texture than things like tofu.

So we're gonna braise it.

And the way we're gonna do that is we're gonna take a well-seasoned cast iron skillet, add some avocado oil.

Some balsamic vinegar for sweet.

Get a really good balsamic vinegar.

Get one that pours like a syrup.

Don't get the cheap three-dollar bottle in the supermarket.

Just don't do it.

You'll regret it.

A little soy sauce.

And this is actually gonna marinate and braise our tempeh all at the same time.

So we're gonna take thinly sliced tempeh and lay it in the braising liquid like this.

As many pieces as you like.

Usually, an eight-ounce brick of tempeh feeds like three or four people, so like in our house, for two people, we use half a brick.

Okay, then we're gonna add to it the juice of an orange.

And you want to get the orange juice in there before it starts to really get going so it doesn't spit all over the place on your stove.

That goes in.

Then we'll add some minced garlic.

Finely minced so you get a good, strong garlic flavor.

Right, what you're doing is seasoning the tempeh for the dish.

It's really easy.

The last thing to go into this part is some fresh basil and some parsley.

And we're just gonna cut the stems off and coarsely chop this.

And it goes right on top so it doesn't overcook, but because you're cutting it, the aromatic oils from the parsley and the basil will sort of bleed into the dish and help to flavor the tempeh even more.

So just a really coarse chop like that, and it sort of goes right on top.

Then you lower the heat, and you're just gonna let this braise.

And while it's braising, you just kind of go in here with a fork and move it around.

And it can go really quickly.

If your heat's high, you just turn them and they're ready to go.

You want to braise them evenly on both sides, and what you want to do is get this nice golden color.

So you flip 'em.

They aggravate you sometimes 'cause they don't want to flip, but a fork is the easiest way to do this.

So...

They're gonna finish braising.

And then what we're gonna do is take-- this is lacinato or dinosaur kale which is sort of a heartier kale, but you can use curly kale, you can use whatever you want.

We're gonna slice it into thin ribbons, and we're gonna use the kale raw and you'll see why in a minute.

We're just gonna slice this up.

The thinner, the better because we are using it raw and it can be difficult to digest.

Okay, so to plate this up, you're just gonna take your kale and make a bed, right, for the tempeh to live on.

Then you're gonna take your skillet, bring it over here and dish your tempeh right into the middle of this sort of bed of kale like this.

You're gonna take what's remaining of your sauce, your marinade, your braising liquid, and dress the kale with that.

Then, the final thing is you hit this with a little squirt of lemon juice to kind of lift the flavor and help you digest the oil and help to wilt the greens.

♪ So what are you waiting for?

Let's get back to the cutting board, and I'll see you next time on Christina Cooks.

(mellow music) ♪ ♪ (announcer) Underwriting for Christina Cooks is provided by Suzanne's Specialties, offering a full line of alternative vegan and organic sweeteners and toppings.

Suzanne's Specialties, sweetness the way Mother Nature intended.

Additional funding is also provided by Old Yankee Cutting Boards, designed for durability and custom crafted by hand with Yankee pride and craftsmanship.

♪ Jonathan's Spoons, individually handcrafted from cherry wood, each designed with your hand and purpose in mind.

♪ Additional funding is also provided by: ♪ You can find today's recipes and learn more by visiting our website at: And by following Christina on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest.

The companion cookbook, "Back to the Cutting Board," takes you on a journey to re-engage with the soul of cooking.

With more than 100 plant-based recipes, finding the joy in cooking has never been simpler.

To order your copy for $20 plus handling, call: Add Christina's iconic book, "Cooking the Whole Foods Way," with 500 delicious plant-based recipes.

To order both books for $39.95 plus handling, call: ♪ (bright music)