Vegan Mofo Vegan Iron chef challenge part 2

All the sweetness of part one left me craving salty, savory fried food, but hey, we're having Moroccan for dinner, so that's healthy, right? lol So I figure what better way to cure the craving than with some good old fashioned slightly altered Puerto Rican cuisine. And by slightly altered, I mean swapping bananas for the plantains. Green bananas mind you, or they'd probably fall apart in the pan. Piononos (which ironically also means pinwheels) were one of my favorite foods when I visited the island of enchantment. So here it goes:

Last night when I got home from the store, I took an 1/8th of a cup of the coffee beans, ground them up, and tossed them in with some annatto in a 1/2 cup of olive oil. Shook the hell out of them, and let them sit. Everytime I'd walk by it I shook it, to make it orange, and give it a lil more coffee aroma.

Start by making a basic recipe of sofrito:



2 large tomatoes ( I used one large red, a medium orange, and a small yellow)
1.5 onions
1.5 green peppers
1 red pepper
a head of garlic
a bunch of cilantro


Basically, take the seeds out of the peppers and toss the stems and puree the hell out of everything else. It makes a ton, but it's so damned tasty, I'm sure you'll have no problem finding uses for the rest :)

Take 2 big ass cuts of seitan (cuz seitan comes in cuts, right?), grate them with a cheese grater. Saute them in coffee bean and annato infused olive oil (about 2 tbsp of it?), throw in 3 heaping tbsp of sofrito, and one pkg of sazon.

The batter, take 1/8th of an extra firm refrigerator pkg of tofu, mix with 1/2 cup of all purpose flour, and 3/8ths cup of milk, add a 1/4th tsp of garlic salt, and mix well in the food processor.

When the seitan picadillo is "done" remove from heat, take the rest of the coffee and annato infused olive oil and bring to medium high heat. Take 3 green bananas and slice into 3-4 lengthwise strips. Very carefully (cuz bananas are bitchier than plantains) fry and flip them.Sprinkle with a little garlic salt. Let cool. when cooled, take 2 pieces and toothpick them together to form a circle. Fill with the batter one one end, and then some of the seitan picadillo mixture. Then top with more batter, let fry for about 3-5 minutes until the dough is solid and slightly golden. Flip and repeat. This should make 5-6 piononos depending upon the size of your bananas. And you'll have about a cup and a hlf of picadillo left over for Tuesday evening :)