Culinary Fun With Tofu

Tofu, Yuck! That’s sounds disgusting, I’d rather eat dirt.

That’s the reaction most people have to tofu. I used to be one of those people since I had never eaten properly prepared tofu. You may not know it, but you are probably already eating foods containing soybeans, the main ingredient in tofu. Well I had my turn at it a year ago, I went over my aunt’s house and she prepared tofu (her specialty).  I was stuck between a hard place and a rock since I was hungry and couldn’t say no to her (actually no one can say no to her). To my surprise, I liked it!

Some Health Talk for all the health junkies: A serving contains 13% of your daily protein quota, with only 3% of your daily fat. It has no cholesterol, and 55 calories. So it's not good if you want to gain extra weight. In Asia, where soy-based diets have traditionally been the norm, rates of cancer and cardiovascular diseases are lower than in the Western world.

Plain tofu has no taste at all so you can think of tofu as your canvas, and the spices as your palette. You design your tofu to fit your taste buds. My days of experimenting with tofu has come a long way. See the recipe for yourself; try it first, judge later!  

6 cakes of tofu (diced into cubes)

1 red pepper (thinly sliced)

4 long green chili peppers (diced finely)

3 stocks of green onion (diced finely)

2 tbsp. ginger root (diced finely)

½ cup olive oil

¼ cup golden mountain seasoning sauce

6 whole black pepper corn

1 tbsp. red pepper powder

1 tbsp. cumin

2 tsp. black pepper powder

1 tbsp.  turmeric powder (haldi)

Salt according to taste

½ cup salted cashews

Iceberg  lettuce (chopped finely)

1. Drain the water from the tofu (you always do that, unless you want watery tofu--it's up to you.) Slice tofu into cube. Heat a wok or skillet, add oil, then all the tofu…cook until most of the water has evaporated.
2. Add the red peppers and green chili into the skillet. Cook until the tofu starts to turn brown, make sure stir the tofu gently, otherwise you will burn it and it won’t brown on all sides.
3. Reduce the heat to medium! Add the seasoning sauce and cover the skillet. Cook until the red peppers begin to soften, after that add the green onions and ginger to the skillet and stir the tofu.
4. While the red peppers are cooking, heat a small skillet over high heat, add 1 tbsp. of oil, cashews, black pepper corn and cumin to the skillet. Heat the mixture for a few minutes, until you can smell the cumin. Turn the heat off once the cashews reach a light brown color.
5. Add the mixture from the small skillet into the tofu. Add salt, black pepper, turmeric powder, and red pepper according to your taste and stir and cover the tofu for 5 minutes.
6. Your Done, its time to eat. To plate the dish, add ½ cup chopped lettuce into a plate, top it with the tofu and enjoy a healthy yet tasty dinner…

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