Amanda Fox started out making vegan soap in middle school, a hobby that she began with her mother in the outskirts of Scranton, Pennsylvania. Soon the hobby was built into a brick-and-mortar business called The Fanciful Fox, which moved to Bushwick in 2014.
About a year ago, a friend had asked for help filling out an order of seitan for the Orchard Grocer, an all-vegan deli and market in the Lower East Side. Working with the recipes her friend had left her for the gluten-based meat substitute, Fox didn’t think she was half-bad. “I grew up on Pennsylvania comfort food—I just want something you can throw on a skillet and make it taste good,” Fox says.
Shortly after, came Seitan’s Helper, its name was born in the middle of a late-night episode of Ash vs Evil Dead. Its logo is a ghoulish incarnation of death that seems to be smirking outside of its fatal robes. Fox calls the decision to land on seitan a happy accident. “For me, tempeh and tofu were the ‘OGs’ that I remember turning to when I went vegan but seitan was different. It has more of a bite to it and you can do so many more things with it,” says Fox.
