The Muddy Kitchen: Tofu or Not Tofu?

Sure, tofu has a bad reputation. It's not exactly bursting with flavor or visual appeal. Gelatinous blocks of bean curd that don't even have the gall to taste very beany, mmmm. And you always read that tofu "takes on the flavors it's cooked with". I never noticed that. To my palette, tofu always managed to provide stubborn flavorlessness in cube form, no matter how delectable the soup or sauce it was floating around in.

Where am I going with this? A tofu recipe. A tofu recipe you might be able to believe in, because it is being passed on to you by somebody who "gets it", okay? Tofu is gross. I see things your way. You can trust me now. The following recipe might not make you love tofu, but it might just make you hate it less, which is saying a lot for a glistening chunk of colorless beanscum.

First, I'd like to clear up any confusion. This is not the Tofu I'm talking about.
This is Tofu, our pet pig, and she doesn't want to be deep-fried any more than I want to deep-fry her. She also has some nutty theories about the safety of soy food that hasn't been fermented. So, lest we go forward, patting ourselves on the back for eating "healthy", just know that nothing is so good for you that you should overdo it. More research, or a good dose of defeatism might be healthier than any one food choice. Besides, it's deep-fried, so it's all a lost cause. Let's just enjoy ourselves.

My friend, Marlene, sent me How to Cook Everything, by Mark Bittman, many years ago. I have used it more than I ever imagined using any cookbook. That's where I first saw the recipe for Deep-Fried Tofu, but I ignored it. I only hated deep-frying slightly less than I hated tofu.

Easy Girl, not you. I love you.

I gave fried tofu a chance when eating out at Momiji Chinese & Japanese Restaurant, in Lincoln City, Oregon. It was the whole gang of us, and all children were tired and hungry. As a parent, you pretty much sweat bullets, if you have any conscience at all, bringing a bunch of potentially volcanic kids into a restaurant. The first thing on the menu that jumped out at me was the Agedashi Tofu (deep fried cubes), on the appetizer section of the menu. It'd be out soon, it's sort of a finger food, and it's not spicy. Yes, two orders of that, please. It was fabulous, simple, and the kids woofed it down, so to speak. This is what led me to think maybe I would try it in my own kitchen.

Usually, I just serve it with sweet chili or soy sauce, but at Momiji, it was served with a sauce that I would guess contained rice vinegar and sesame oil.


First drain the tofu.

Relax, Baby. Still talking about the food.

I prefer to use firm over anything else. Slash the packages and let all the fluid drain out. Then cube it (1") and set the cubes on something absorbent, like a clean dishtowel. Give them all afternoon to dry. The drier they are, the easier they are to work with, which is the reason I go for firm when buying the tofu in the first place. Mark's recipe calls for the silken tofu, which is too much for me to mess with when I'm deep-frying.

When I'm ready to cook them, I prepare a dry mixture of flour, salt and pepper, and a mixture of egg yolks and ice water.
Each cube gets rolled around in the flour mixture, dunked in the egg mixture, fried until golden brown, drained on a paper bag, and eaten quickly by me and Geza.

I also feed some to the kids, but they have to be around to get their fair share. Fresh out of the fryer? It's too good to set on a plate and call somebody downstairs for. Too poppable. When I finally do offer it to them, they pig out on it.

What? Girl, don't be mad. You eat constantly. It's fitting.