tofu or not tofu

this weekend i did a food demo at the cowbridge food festival and the theme for this year was tofu. this is a very versatile ingredient that may not have great flavour but can carry flavours. here are the recipes, fresh tofu bring one litre of soy milk to the boil and add a coagulant. i use one and a half teaspoons of nigari flakes to 150ml of cold water. dissolve and add to the hot milk and let the soy milk turn into curds and whey. you then need to mould the mix. i think that the best moulds would be 2 500g containers of margarine. put some holes into the bottom of one of the containers to let the water run away and line it with some muslin or a clean tea towel, pour the mix in and let the water drain. once the curds are separate, fold the tea towel over and place the second container on top, squeeze and weigh down. place in the fridge overnight, then store in cold water. tofu done simple. cut your tofu into squares and marinate in a mix of tamari or soy sauce and sweet chilli sauce. you can leave this for a couple of minutes or a couple of hours and eat it like this or fry in veg oil. cook like a chef burgers break up 200g of tofu and add 100g of mixed ground nuts and breadcrumbs. add a dash of tamari and a tablespoon of tahini then chop up some dill and add. mix together with a fork and taste for balance of flavours. add about 30g of rice flour to help the bind and form into burgers. fry in veg oil until golden brown. thai tofu cakes as above but rather then dill add a tablespoon of red curry paste and some chopped coriander. lebanese tofu cakes as above but add a mix of mint, coariander, parsley, lemon juice, lime juice and ras el hanout. red curry paste. Thai Curry paste 8 chillies. The long dutch ones are the best because they tend to be not too hot. If you like it hotter, use a couple of thai chillies as well. You should probably taste the chillies to decide whether you want to go seeds in or seeds out. Green for a green paste and red for a red paste. A thumb sized piece of ginger. You can also use galangal if you can get it but if you can’t, don’t sweat it. 6 cloves of garlic 1 or 2 shallots, only one if it a good size banana shallot. A small bunch of coriander A few teaspoons of thai basil and kaffir lime leaves. You can buy jars of these in good supermarkets or Asian stores. If you cannot get them throw a few leaves of basil and a few leaves of mint in. The juice and zest of two limes A teaspoon of tamarind extract Half a thumb of palm sugar A tablespoon of ground cumin and ground coriander. Put all of the above into a food processor or blender and blend until a paste forms. You can add oil or water to encourage blending. cheers wayne