Recipe Review: Totally Awesome Tofu

Shortly after becoming vegan, I somehow stumbled upon Beth Terry's blog Fake Plastic Fish which details her attempts to live a plastic-free lifestyle. I've always been a big fan of the environmental movement and decided to put my money where my mouth is and try to do something to reduce my own consumption. So I wrote a list and posted it on my freezer of food items that came packaged in plastic, whether or not I could make them on my own, and what I could do to replace or live without items that I didn't know how to make.

I immediately started buying things in glass jars and started buying things in bulk more often. These days I won't buy oil or vinegar unless it's in bulk, because even the glass jars come capped with plastic. But I digress. Some of the things on my list weren't so easy, and I still haven't taken all of the plastic out of my life. A huge gallon sized jug of mustard (yes, they do exist) doesn't use as many resources as many 8-oz bottles, but it's still plastic. And every few weeks I'd buy more packages of tofu and tempeh. I'd say that Jeff and I, roughly, consume three blocks of tofu and maybe an equal number of tempeh packages per week. And I'd sigh, and toss the tempeh package in the trash and set aside the tofu carton to plant seedlings in.

And then I found this cute little book while I was back at home during Troy Night Out: Cooking with Tofu by Mary Ann DuSablon. It's part of a series of pamphlets published by Storey Press dedicated to teaching everyone, including city folk such as myself, necessary skills for living smaller and simpler. I initially picked it up because of the recipe for eggless mayo, but then realized it also had a tofu recipe in it.

I had tried two or three tofu recipes up to this point. Jeff and I would invest a lot of time into making the soymilk, curdling with coagulant (packaged in plastic, came with our tofu kit) and pressing, only to get a tiny, 1-oz slice of tofu. All of that effort for something we ate in 30 seconds! Tofu making isn't quick or even necessarily that easy the first time you try it, so you definitely want a return on your investment. Enter the new recipe book. The first thing I knew I was doing right was adding a substantial amount of soybeans. It doesn't make sense to get a pound of tofu out of less than a cup of soybeans, right? And the coagulants the recipe suggests are simple things like lemon juice or apple cider vinegar, that you probably already have. No weird phrases like nigari are thrown around.

The recipe is incredibly intuitive, and Jeff and I were very excited to produce a nice big, solid block of tofu. (I'd say at least a pound.) We used three times the vinegar called for, which makes an extra firm block. We cut this into thirds and have three meals out of it. This is enough for about one week for us, and each weekend when we have time we will make more. The nice thing about tofu is that, if you have enough beans, and a big enough pot, you can double the recipe and make twice as much with just as much effort.

By the way, if you already have a soymilk maker, then 99% of the hard work of making tofu is already done. Just take your fresh soymilk, pour in the coagulant, let the tofu form for 10-15 minutes, and then press it in a cheesecloth lined strainer or similarly lined tofu press.

Another wonderful thing about this recipe is that the blended beans are boiled before being strained. This means that the pulp that remains in the cheesecloth as the soymilk filters out, which is known as okara, is cooked. Jeff and I have made okara burgers with uncooked okara before, and I never knew that they would be so much more delicious with cooked okara! It's a night and day change, and I can't rave about the amazing taste and texture of cooked okara enough. We also found this fantastic recipe for okara bread and I just want to eat it all the time! The first batch of tofu we made with this recipe, we didn't save all the okara, thinking we wouldn't use it all. I regretted that decision the moment I took a bite out of the first loaf of okara bread.

I wish I could reproduce the recipe here, but the book makes it pretty clear that it's copyrighted. I have not found any other recipes online that are as good. So all I can do is recommend that you just spend the few bucks buying this pamphlet, because it will save so much money from buying tofu, and save a lot of plastic from the landfill!

Next up: tempeh. Jeff and I just ordered a tempeh culture but it hasn't arrived yet. Hopefully it will be just as delicious and rewarding as the tofu.



Tofu

Angora Cafe and Super 88: Packard's Corner Vegan Havens

Angora Cafe on Commonwealth Ave at Babcock St is now carrying soy frozen yogurt!

Similar to the Amsterdam Cafe in downtown Boston, they throw a vanilla soy soft serve into a machine, mix in whatever flavors you want (there are 30), and then give it to you. My favorite is green tea. SO good.

The price is pretty steep: $4.50 for about 1/3 of a pint, but it is truly delicious and refreshing if you need soft serve. Sometimes I do. For more bang for your buck, go to the Amsterdam Cafe, where for a similar price you get a full pint of the stuff and a beautiful neighborhood to walk through.

On to Asian supermarket fabulousity!

When we first moved to Lower Allston, we heard from many friends that Super 88 in P.C. was on its way out. Very little food on pallets and shelves, not much to speak of that was vegetarian. It sounded like the most disappointing shopping trip ever.

Lo and behold the Hong Kong Supermarket! It has taken over the Super 88 and restocked the shelves with tons of vegan goodness. Lots of tofu for an incredible price (even the locally made Cambridge tofu), frozen pot stickers and buns with veggie or lotus seed or red bean paste filling, oodles of noodles, aisles and aisles of sauces and dips, including the beloved Sriracha, and of course tons of Asian produce for a good price. Just bring a jacket-it's freezing in there.

New Projects: Pickled Turnips, Cream Soda, Canned Salsa

A few weeks ago I did something depressing, I bought a whole bunch of seeds. Why is it depressing? Because I live in Boston, and it's mid-January. As optimistic as I am that it's only going to get warmer (unless it gets colder first which is only too likely in New England), spring and summer are still months away. I can only daydream about how awesome my garden is going to be.

I also got out a bunch of cookbooks from the local libraries, and they are also making me wish for spring and summer and bountiful amounts of fresh fruits and vegetables. Last summer I made pickles for the first time, and that was pretty much my gateway drug to canning. The quick pickles were delicious, but the canned ones I did and let sit in the cabinet for a few months were nothing short of mouthwatering. Needless to say, I made sure to buy seeds for pickling cucumbers. I want to make buckets of pickles this summer!



The three books I got are (from left to right) Homemade Root Beer, Soda & Pop by Stephen Cresswell, The Joy of Pickling by Linda Ziedrich and Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving edited by Judi Kingry and Lauren Devine.

Homemade Root Beer, Soda & Pop by Stephen Cresswell
Jeff and I have made ginger ale and root beer, and I really wanted to try out new recipes, so I found this book and decided to give it a try. Last night I made the cream soda (of course, I changed around the ingredients a bit) and it was delicious even before fermentation. We bottled them into glass bottles for the first time, having just purchased a capper from our local homebrew store. I like glass bottles way better than plastic, the only disappointing thing is that the metal caps still have a small piece of plastic on top. It's still a lot less plastic than comes in new plastic caps, though.

I was shocked at how quickly they fermented, this morning the one plastic bottle we filled as a fermentation tester was already rock hard. I don't know if the ale yeast we purchased is just quicker than bread yeast or what, but I was surprised that it was such a fast process. We put all 9 bottles in the fridge and Jeff and I had a taste this afternoon after they were nice and cool. It's definitely unlike any factory made cream soda that you've ever had, and I think brewed soda can be an acquired taste if you're used to Coke, but I thought it was pretty darn good. I like our root beer better, and I'm already thinking of doing some sort of fruit flavored cream soda for better taste.

I'm definitely going to try more of the recipes in this book, and I think, more importantly, that it's a good book to use as a springboard for trying out our own recipes in the future. More than just recipes, the book also includes a history of sodas, the brewing process, and other interesting tidbits.

The Joy of Pickling by Linda Ziedrich
Jeff and I have been getting copious amounts of turnips from our produce shipment, and we haven't been particularly good about eating them. In leafing through this book I found a recipe for Korean Pickled Turnips and decided to give it a try. What better way to enjoy anything than to ferment it?! The list of ingredients was short (and all basic stuff we already had) and the process was very simple. I was pleased to see a good amount of brine after rubbing the sliced turnips with salt, and after a few hours put the turnips and other ingredients into a quart sized jar to sit out for awhile. I'll report back in a week or so and comment on whether or not they're any good. For now, they smell fantastic and I can't wait to try it out.

The book has many recipes for pickling pretty much everything, not just the standard cucumber. (But it has many recipes for cucumbers in case your old standard just isn't doing it for you any more.) While I will skip the last chapter on pickling meat, fish and eggs (yuck), I look forward to trying out kimchi and maybe see if we can't pickle some of our other stubborn root vegetables.

Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving edited by Judi Kingry and Lauren Devine
This book is the one that is really making me pine for summer. The first few chapters are all about jams, preserves and fruit spreads. I love nothing more than a good jam on my morning biscuits (especially these decadent Side Hill Farm jams made in Vermont). Hopefully I will have plenty of opportunity to try them out come summer. The only thing is that the recipes mostly all call for pectin, and I would like to try the slow boil method to get more flavor from the fruit. At the very least I think the recipes make for good guidelines, how much sugar to add to how much fruit, etc.

But that's not all that's included in this massive tome. This book also covers pickling, condiments, salsas, pie fillings, sauces, vinegars, and pretty much anything you can put in a can and preserve.

I decided to try the jalapeño salsa because I rarely ever make salsa with our Mexican themed dinners. Why? Because I never want to go out and buy a tomato, but we always have beans, rice, peppers, onions and fixings for tortillas. I finally realized that instead of making fresh salsa before every meal, I can can it and eat it as I need it. What a novel idea! The salsa, miraculously, fit into exactly 6 half-pint jars so I was unable to taste any. Given how much Jeff and I love eating burritos, I'm sure I'll be trying it out real soon.

Cool Things - X's to O's Vegan Bakery

I wrote this review on Yelp a few months back, and feel it's worth repeating here on Vegtopia. I spent the first 20+ years of my life in the capital district area of NY, and went to college in Troy. I wasn't vegan until I moved to Boston, but now that I am I know that I can go home to a newly opened vegan bakery on 4th Street. How awesome is that? Become their fan on Facebook and check them out if you live in the area!

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A vegan bakery in Troy is basically my dream come true. Unfortunately I don't live in Troy anymore so I can only indulge in these delicious desserts when I travel home.

I was so excited to visit X's to O's last Thanksgiving break that I ordered 4 goodies - a cinnamon raisin cookie, maple walnut cupcake, cinnamon roll, and a gluten free pumpkin canoe ("twinkie"). The owner and woman working at the counter were both very friendly, and the owner remembered me from leaving comments on their Facebook page.

The inside of the bakery was very sparse but I am under the impression that they are working on expanding their bakery as they had previously just focused on wholesale orders. I'm excited to see how it evolves over time.

But the important part of my review - how were the pastries? Excellent! Even after sitting in my parent's fridge overnight, they were still amazing. My favorite was the cinnamon bun, it was sweet with just the right amount of cinnamon and the bun itself was a delicious offset to the sweetness. The cupcake was decadent, and if I had a more robust sweet tooth I probably would have loved it even more. Not to say that it wasn't wonderful, it was just on the sweet side. The cookie was amazing, I think the first cinnamon raisin I've eaten since going vegan, and cinnamon raisin is my favorite cookie. The pumpkin canoe was a bit weird, but I got it for my boyfriend as a novelty really. I'd be interested in trying their other canoe flavors in the future.

Will I be going to X's to O's again? YES! Every time I'm back home I will make sure to visit this wonderful bakery. I don't have to lament the fact that I can't enjoy delicious baked goods from Troy (Cookie Factory, previously Vanilla Bean) as X's to O's has stepped up to the plate to ensure that us vegans will never go without a satisfied sweet tooth again.

Cranberry Orange Marmalade

Jeff and I got some cranberries in our produce shipment about a month or so ago. I had never cooked with real cranberries before - the only cranberries I ate were the dried kind or the jellied ones that come in a can completely pureed. (Yep, the kind that takes the shape of the can so you can see the little ridges on the side as it's displayed on Thanksgiving day.)

Needless to say I had no idea what to do with them, but that was the whole idea of getting a produce shipment in the first place. We also had a few oranges sitting around, so I instantly thought of marmalade. I did a quick google search and came up with a recipe for cranberry marmalade.

It came out enough to fill 9 half-pint jars, with a little bit left over for taste testing. Jeff and I ate ours at least a month after canning, and the taste had settled in by then, very sweet and delicious. I think I ate most of the marmalade in two sittings. They are superb on this Vegalicious biscuit recipe.

This was also the first time I canned using a canning funnel, and I can say that it's definitely worth purchasing. You don't have to clean up nearly as many messes when you're not messing around with spooning stuff in to jars!

Peace 'o Pie, Allston, MA

Jeff and I just went to Peace 'o Pie, the new vegan pizza shop in Allston, MA. It replaces TJ Scallywaggle's House of Vegan Pizza, which Jeff and I would hit up every other week almost religiously for their 10$ all-you-can eat buffet. It's certainly nice to have a vegan pizza place open again. It was getting a bit depressing for a while here in the Allston/Brighton/Brookline area when TJ's closed up shop and My Thai closed their Brookline location in favor of Chinatown.

It's not that Jeff and I eat out often, these days we go out once a month at best, but it's still nice to know that there are vegan places out there for the rare occasions when we don't feel like cooking, and I'm glad they exist for people who, unlike us, prefer not to cook.

For simplicity's sake I'll re-post my Yelp review of Peace 'o Pie below if you are interested. I gave them 4 stars.

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I really enjoyed TJ's, so I came to Peace 'o Pie very skeptical of the idea of "gourmet" pizza. I like my pizzas plain and simple without fancy stuff overwhelming the flavor. I have to say that I was very impressed with their pizza. I got a large "Fresh" pizza, which was sauce, Vegan Gourmet cheese, pesto, broccoli and onions. The sauce was delicious, the pesto was great, and the other toppings were good as well.

I would give Peace 'o Pie 5 stars were it not for the price. A large pizza was 18$ and while filling, I feel that's pretty expensive for a pizza. The toppings were also sparse and the cheese didn't even cover the entire pizza.

As far as the ambiance goes I liked the feeling of TJ's more, but I like how Peace 'o Pie has more sitting room with tables instead of booths. I do agree with one commenter who mentioned the lack of animal rights literature. I liked that you could always find a pamphlet about something at TJ's, or the most recent anarchist newsletter. Peace 'o Pie definitely caters to the more yuppie-ish, upper middle class vegan set.

I asked the owner if he plans to do a buffet, and it's not in the works for now. I'll probably go back to Peace 'o Pie every now and again, and I'm sure if they do a biweekly buffet I'll be there rain or shine as I did at TJ's. Peace 'o Pie definitely has good service, they know how to make a good pizza, and I feel like they have a better business mindset that will avoid the financial problems that TJ's was so burdened with.

Finally, I liked how clean the place was. That was the only thing that bugged me about TJ's, was how the booths always seemed to be covered in a layer of grime. They keep the tables at Peace 'o Pie very clean, and I'm sure it'll keep looking nice as time goes on.

Okara Burgers and Zucchini Bread

Alyssa and I just moved into our new place, and have been unpacking boxes for the past few days. Naturally, the kitchen supplies and equipment were at the top of our list to unpack. We are loving the new kitchen space (previously cooking out of a kitchenette) and have not only unpacked all our stuff, but brewed soda, began fermenting wine, made a huge batch of hot sauce, and canned a bunch of pickles. Before this weekend we hadn't tried any of these things, but what a great time to try something new.

Along with these, I made a batch of soymilk. The thing with making soymilk is that the fresh milk is great if you can get used to the bean-ey taste. We've used it in the past with our recipes with no noticeable difference from storebought soymilk. What is inconvenient with the process is that you are left with the pulpy bean bits that don't make it through the filter into the finished product. These bean bits are called Okara, and until now we didn't have the slightest inclination to use them. They did make good compost, but they would weigh down the trash if the compost was full.

Keeping with the adventurous theme of the weekend, I searched for a recipe in The Book of Tofu. This book deserves credit, as the soy milk recipe and most other Tofu recipes in the Joy of Cooking are derived from this book. The recipe is not vegan (it calls for egg), but it's easily veganized. I used egg replacer instead of the 1 egg that it calls for, plus a tablespoon or two of water to get the burger mixture to the right consistency.



The burgers ended up being much more cohesive that was expected. We had made bean burgers in the past that used vital wheat gluten, but the egg replacer and whole wheat flour held the Okara together quite nicely. The burgers were cooked in the cast iron skillet:





A few minutes of browning on each side and they were done, just in time for the Savory Zucchini Bread to come out of the oven. The Zucchini Bread recipe was from vegalicious:

Vegalicious Savory Zucchini Bread

We found that adding 1/4 C more soymilk than the recipe called for was required for the dough to be moist and cohesive. Alyssa didn't like the italian spices that was called for, so we made another one without them. I thought both were delicious, especially sopping up mushroom gravy.





We also replaced the 1/4 C vegan butter with 1/8 C Canola Oil, skipped sauteing the onions, and didn't squeeze out the zucchini. It came out great nonetheless. It always feels good to improvise a recipe and have it turn out much better than expected. This was the perfect end to a great weekend.



Okara

Go Max Go Candy Bars

Edit on 6-22-2009: A commenter has pointed out that I misread the response I obtained from Go Max Go. The soybeans may very well be GM, as they do not specifically purchase non GM soybeans. This means that if you eat a Go Max Go candy bar, you are very likely eating GM soybeans.
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I read about Go Max Go candy bars on a post at BitterSweet Blog and was instantly intrigued. When was the last time I've eaten a candy bar? And I absolutely loved Three Musketeers bars before going vegan.

I was instantly skeptical, however, and immediately went to the website for more information. Nothing in the bars is organic, and I was curious as to whether or not the company used genetically modified soybeans and if they knew if the soy lecithin was processed with hexane or not. I sent an e-mail to the company and got a reply back:

Thanks for your interest in Go Max Go. Our soybeans are not certified non gm. As for the soy lecithin, we truly do not know if it is processed with
hexane solvent. Ingredients such as soy lecithin are purchased for our use after they have been processed. Just as when you buy a bottle of olive oil, you are not involved with the pressing of the olives.

I'm glad that they don't use genetically modified soybeans, although I'm sure that the soy lecithin is processed with hexane. I'm sure if these candy bars were available in stores around Boston, I'd probably buy a few and try them out. However, I'm not dying for candy bars enough to go through the hassle of online ordering.

Cake!

I saw a recipe for lemon raspberry cake on Vegalicious, the first vegan recipe blog I subscribed to way back in the day when I was learning vegan basics. Although the recipe was posted in early March I immediately sent it to Jeff and told him that this is the cake I would want for my 25th birthday. (Jeff and I don't buy each other gifts, instead we make each other baked goods for birthdays.)

The cake is absolutely divine. Jeff made it with limes instead of lemon, and the entire kitchen smelled like key lime pie while it was baking. The frosting was a bit thick, I like creamier frosting, but it was still delicious. I had just purchased a pastry decorator and had a hard time piping it through the nozzle, and it was my first try with the decorator. Hopefully I'll get more practice with decorating baked goods in the future. (I was also only able to take one or two photos because my parents, Jeff and I wanted to eat it instead of waiting forever for me to get a lot of shots.)