katbot and I eat about 5-8 lbs of the stuff a week. I have gotten quite good at cook with it and have a few tips should you wish to try and make something palettable out of the relatively bland stuff.
Use Firm or Extra firm, these types of tofu lend themselves better to most recipes without becoming shapeless mush.
Press the tofu well before cooking with it. Tofu is stored in water and as such it contains a large ammount of moisture. Failure to press the tofu before marinating or otherwise cooking with it will prevent the flavors from soaking into it. I generall press the tofu by placing 1 or 2 one pound blocks betwwen two dinner plates and then stacking a bunch of cans of tuna (16) on top. Pour off all excess fluid, If this doesn't result in firm/dry enough consistancy I sometimes pop the plate with the tofu into the microwave for a few minutes to boil off a little of the moisture still deep inside.
Once your tofu is pressed you can basically substitute it in any recipe which calls for meat. I'm fond of making stir fry with it by first seasoning a wok with several tablespoons of peanutoil, crushed garlic, minced ginger, and a diced white onion. The tofu is chopped into cubes and added, then cooked over HIGH heat until it begins to brown on the sides similar to what you would expect from a cubed chicken breast. I then usually add chopped mushrooms and broccoli florets. Further flavour is added by tossing in a bit of fish sauce, shoyu, rice vinegar, whitewine, crushed red peppers, and coarsely ground black pepper to taste. A pinch of white sugar and corn starch dissolved in warm water can be added after a few minutes to thicken the liquid into a sauce that will coat the veggies and tofu. I like mine over rice, but katbot prefers hers on an empty plate :) Yum.
Also, last night I whipped up a little italian by doing the above pressing/microwaving routine and then making breaded tofu cutlets and baking them with parmesian cheese and then topping with a homemade tomato basil sauce I whipped up.
The thing about tofu is that it is mostly flavourless and the texture tends to be too mushy for most western pallettes. If you do the whole pressing bit above and stick to firm or extra firm tofu you can usually end up with some decent dishes and if it tastes horribly, you can just eat the vegies and/or sauce :)
Apparently the meaning of "extra firm" varies from brand to brand.
Dishes that are basically meat recipes with something else substituted for the meat don't appeal to me as much as ones that were conceived as vegetarian (or meat-optional) from the start, in general, so perhaps part of my slowness in warming up to tofu is that when I went veg, I didn't miss the meat. (In fact, I find some TVP dishes downright unpleasant if they mimic the texture of meat too well.) The big excepton is my ought-to-be-famous vegetarian chili, which is modelled on my mother's chili con carne as a starting point before all the Glennish touches are added. In that, cracked wheat takes on the job that the ground beef usually does, without actually pretending to be meat.
I'm not good at stir fry (argh! it looks easy!) but that's on my list of skills to improve already; I can see using tofu as a minor ingredient in a vegetable stir fry once I get decent at that.
I don't really use recipes so it was sort of a halfassed comment for me to say substitue for meat in meat dishes. Basically my cooking style is to familiarize myselof with the flavor of all the ingredients separately and then combine them in ways that are inspired by how I interpret the flavor combinations from different styles of cooking that I've tried before. Which is to say that my "subsistute for meat" instruction was to say that the subtle nutty flavor queue of tofu when combined with a good tamari or shoyu fills in the part of the flavor boquette that would normally be occupied by chicken, beef, lamb, etc... I'm only sorta vegetarian (I prefer the term meat reductionist), I guess the proper term is ova-lacto-pisco-vegetarian; hence the fish sauce suggestion in my earlier post. At any rate, katbot can't stand things with meaty flavors and textures and she quite enjoys my tofu dishes so they can't be too "meaty" :)
Another good one that I forgot to mention earlier is teriyaki broiled tofu. I generally use a store bought teriyaki sauce ("soy vey veriyaki" or something equally kitschy sounding) and just layer the pressed sliced tofu into a casserole dish so it make a single layer with little gaps, then I pour enough sauce over it to fill all the gaps and leave a very thin layer of tofu over the top. I then broil this until the top of the tofu is brown and slightly singed where the sugar from the sauce has carmelized at the edges of the dish. I then pile mixture of broccoli and roughly chopped onions on top that have been marinated in a mixture of honey, rice vinegar, apple juice, crushed red pepper, and tamari. I then reduce the oven temp to about 400 degrees and put the layer tofu and veggie casserole dish on the middle rack with a lid (usually an inverted cookie sheet) and ook for an additional 5-10 minutes depending on how well cooked I feel like having my veggies. While it's baking I often reduce the marinade in a sauce pot with a bit of cornstarch to thicken for use as a sauce over the finish product. NOTE: while this is cooked in layers you will find it impossible to serve in layers, I usuualy just use a slotted spoon to dole out heaping mounds of the veggie/tofu goodness and then spoon a bit of the sauce over the top. Goes super good with a nice Ale :)
If I wasn't hungry before, I am now. I'm going to stick my neck out and say that Trader Joe's extra firm is my absolute favourite tofu for anything but a soup, which I hadn't thought of before, (I'm thinking a substitute for roux, in part. There is nothing like flour fried in butter for soup except onions fried in butter.) but will put in the queue to consider. My diet is being overhauled, and I'm poking around at all kinds of combinations that are low-fat, high-protein, low Na, slow-absorption carbohydrates, tryptophan timed right, etc.
The recipes you gave hold great possibilities. (I loathe cooked mushrooms.)
I'll do a tofu entry in my journal. After I eat. I do the pressing, and heartily recommend it: but slice it first and use paper towels in between slices to speed it up. They can be dried and reused. Usually for something icky. Patience of some sorts is not one of the virtues I've been given.
Umm, erh, not to be hypercritical, but a palate is the roof of one's mouth, where the olfactory nerve endings hang out, contributing to the experience of taste, or a taste for certain flavours, which I think is what you meant. A pallette is the board an artist mixes zir paints on, or the range of colours from which a given work is comprised. Or a panel in the armpit in French armour. A paillette is either foil used in enamel work or painting, or a round spangle on a piece of clothing. Sorry. Whack me if I'm wrong. My dictionary isn't helping, though it dragged me in.
Trader Joe's extra firm is THE BOMB! I prefer their organic extra firm over the other kind they have as it always seems to be much much more firm. As for the mispelling, I rarely bother to spell check, but appreciate your headsup ;)
My handiest TJ's only has organic. Didn't know they carried another kind. Okay, we're thinking in the same track tofu-wise (not a word, I know, but useful here).
(no subject)
Once your tofu is pressed you can basically substitute it in any recipe which calls for meat. I'm fond of making stir fry with it by first seasoning a wok with several tablespoons of peanutoil, crushed garlic, minced ginger, and a diced white onion. The tofu is chopped into cubes and added, then cooked over HIGH heat until it begins to brown on the sides similar to what you would expect from a cubed chicken breast. I then usually add chopped mushrooms and broccoli florets. Further flavour is added by tossing in a bit of fish sauce, shoyu, rice vinegar, whitewine, crushed red peppers, and coarsely ground black pepper to taste. A pinch of white sugar and corn starch dissolved in warm water can be added after a few minutes to thicken the liquid into a sauce that will coat the veggies and tofu. I like mine over rice, but
Also, last night I whipped up a little italian by doing the above pressing/microwaving routine and then making breaded tofu cutlets and baking them with parmesian cheese and then topping with a homemade tomato basil sauce I whipped up.
The thing about tofu is that it is mostly flavourless and the texture tends to be too mushy for most western pallettes. If you do the whole pressing bit above and stick to firm or extra firm tofu you can usually end up with some decent dishes and if it tastes horribly, you can just eat the vegies and/or sauce :)
(no subject)
Dishes that are basically meat recipes with something else substituted for the meat don't appeal to me as much as ones that were conceived as vegetarian (or meat-optional) from the start, in general, so perhaps part of my slowness in warming up to tofu is that when I went veg, I didn't miss the meat. (In fact, I find some TVP dishes downright unpleasant if they mimic the texture of meat too well.) The big excepton is my ought-to-be-famous vegetarian chili, which is modelled on my mother's chili con carne as a starting point before all the Glennish touches are added. In that, cracked wheat takes on the job that the ground beef usually does, without actually pretending to be meat.
I'm not good at stir fry (argh! it looks easy!) but that's on my list of skills to improve already; I can see using tofu as a minor ingredient in a vegetable stir fry once I get decent at that.
Thanks for the tips.
(no subject)
Another good one that I forgot to mention earlier is teriyaki broiled tofu. I generally use a store bought teriyaki sauce ("soy vey veriyaki" or something equally kitschy sounding) and just layer the pressed sliced tofu into a casserole dish so it make a single layer with little gaps, then I pour enough sauce over it to fill all the gaps and leave a very thin layer of tofu over the top. I then broil this until the top of the tofu is brown and slightly singed where the sugar from the sauce has carmelized at the edges of the dish. I then pile mixture of broccoli and roughly chopped onions on top that have been marinated in a mixture of honey, rice vinegar, apple juice, crushed red pepper, and tamari. I then reduce the oven temp to about 400 degrees and put the layer tofu and veggie casserole dish on the middle rack with a lid (usually an inverted cookie sheet) and ook for an additional 5-10 minutes depending on how well cooked I feel like having my veggies. While it's baking I often reduce the marinade in a sauce pot with a bit of cornstarch to thicken for use as a sauce over the finish product. NOTE: while this is cooked in layers you will find it impossible to serve in layers, I usuualy just use a slotted spoon to dole out heaping mounds of the veggie/tofu goodness and then spoon a bit of the sauce over the top. Goes super good with a nice Ale :)
This sounds good to me!
The recipes you gave hold great possibilities. (I loathe cooked mushrooms.)
I'll do a tofu entry in my journal. After I eat. I do the pressing, and heartily recommend it: but slice it first and use paper towels in between slices to speed it up. They can be dried and reused. Usually for something icky. Patience of some sorts is not one of the virtues I've been given.
Umm, erh, not to be hypercritical, but a palate is the roof of one's mouth, where the olfactory nerve endings hang out, contributing to the experience of taste, or a taste for certain flavours, which I think is what you meant. A pallette is the board an artist mixes zir paints on, or the range of colours from which a given work is comprised. Or a panel in the armpit in French armour. A paillette is either foil used in enamel work or painting, or a round spangle on a piece of clothing. Sorry. Whack me if I'm wrong. My dictionary isn't helping, though it dragged me in.
Re: This sounds good to me!
Re: This sounds good to me!