Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Making Baked or Grilled Tofu

I have had a ton of questions about this process. I make this at least once a month and I can't believe it has taken me so long to do a post on this.

It took me quite a bit of time to get pretty good at cooking tofu. At first it was terrible. The taste was bland. It was a bad texture, or it would just fall apart in the pan. Now I feel like I'm fairly good at it. And I get better each time.

My biggest tip for cooking with tofu is to press it which will release all of the water (or tofu blood as Seth would say). When you release that water you allow for your marinade or whatnot to come in and flavor it.

I'm going to take you through, step by step, the making of grilled Asian tofu. One of my favorites.

First off, when grilling always use extra firm tofu.



This is the pressing process. Take the block of tofu out of the package and dump the water that it was in. Wrap the block in a clean kitchen towel, put it on a plate, and put something heavy on top of it. I always use the top to my panini pan. You could use another pan, a plate with something on it, etc. The kitchen towel will absorb all of the water in the tofu. Let this sit in the fridge for a half a day or so. (if I'm making it during the week I will put in the fridge just like this and then marinate it when I get home from work...8 hours later)



Here is the marinade for the tofu. I have adapted this from Veganomicon. 3 T soy sauce, 1 T sesame oil (god that is good stuff), 1 T rice vinegar, 2 t "cock sauce"...that red hot chili sauce that is in Thai restaurants, 1 T grated ginger, 2-3 smashed garlic cloves.



I always slice my tofu in the same way. I don't know why. I just like it this way.

First down the middle.



Then into four.



Then into triangles. This will give you 8 pieces. This is enough for just me and Seth but it might feed three in your family.



Let it sit in the fridge for at least an hour if not more. Flip or shake half way through marinating.



Grill on medium high heat (or you can bake it in the oven) for 5 or so minutes on each side.


Damn. That is goooooood.

5 comments:

VegeCooking Club said...

I love making tofu! You are so right. The pressing is so key I finally bought myself one of those tofu presses. I use it about once a week or so. I love the way you do the triangles though. I must try that!

Marti said...

Ok, I was SO excited to see your post! I have decided that I love tofu (I'm about halfway to addicted lately) but yes, pressing is key.

I have also found that freezing also caused the water to come out... seems to form ice crystals which never get fully reabsorbed when they thaw.

I'm definitely going to try your marinade recipe for my next batch!

Taylor said...

I absolutely love baked tofu but I've never grilled it! I like how you cut it..I usually dice mine into cubes but yours look prettier :)

Marla said...

Awesome job clearing this up for so many of us!
It is vegetarian week at Get Grillin' we would love if you submitted up to any 3 recipes (they don't have to be grilled) to our link up. This one would be perfect!
This week we have a ManPans giveaway. http://su.pr/3GCtXU

lorrie said...

Thanks for the specifics. I'll try this for my vegetarian son.