I actually tried out this recipe about three weeks ago and I'd planned to write about it then, but that was when I took my week-long break from blogging. I completely forgot about it until I made it again a couple of days ago and I realized I never posted it.
Spoiler: I liked it enough to make it again--twice--since then.
I bought silken tofu on Amazon and it came in a box of 12. At the time, I had no idea what to do with it! But I'd eaten quite a bit of extra firm tofu by then and really loved it, so I wanted to give the silken tofu a go. A few weeks ago, I tried the recipe for chocolate pudding with the silken tofu and it was SO good. I was very skeptical of this "tofu scramble" idea, though.
When I was losing weight, I ate a lot of scrambled eggs. They were especially convenient for a quick dinner when I was home by myself. I used to make them with butter and cheese... and now that I don't eat eggs, butter, OR cheese, how on earth was this tofu scramble going to remind me of scrambled eggs?
Well, according to what I read on several websites, the key ingredient is black salt (also called kala namak). I'd never heard of it, but it supposedly had a sulfur-like smell/taste, reminiscent of eggs. Sounds appealing, right? ("Sulfur-like" is not really what I'm going for when I am looking for something to eat!) But I ordered some from Amazon because I really do love trying new things.
The black salt is actually pink and not black... definitely prettier this way.
I tried this recipe from My Plantiful Cooking--and I *really* liked it! I ate it on a toasted slice of Dave's Killer Bread with vegan butter. I'll link to it again at the end of the post.
The ingredients are really simple: silken tofu, nutritional yeast, garlic powder, onion powder, turmeric, and black salt.
The instructions are super easy, too. First, you mix up the spices...
(Now that I know I like this, I'm going to make a big batch of the seasoning to keep in the pantry and make it even faster. I make a lot of recipes from It Doesn't Taste Like Chicken because I have two of her recipe books. I tried her tofu scramble seasoning after this one and I did not like it. I'm glad I tried this one first, otherwise I may not have tried making a scramble again.)
Then you add the tofu block to a skillet (heated with oil):
Note: I'm really good at cooking scrambled eggs and one of my cooking pet peeves is when eggs are stirred too much while cooking. Rather than fluffy pieces, they wind up being dry and crumbly. I was curious how this tofu was going to turn out in comparison to eggs. However, I went into this thinking of it as "tofu scramble" and not "vegan scrambled eggs"--because I like to call it what it is. And comparing tofu and and eggs is like comparing apples to elephants. Completely different things. I only care about whether it tastes good, regardless of what it's called.
Anyway, the recipe specified to break into large chunks at first ("large" is all relative, so I just figured this size was good):
Then you let it cook for 6-8 minutes without the seasoning and without "scrambling"--so it will release the water from the tofu while not making it dry and crumbly. I just turned the pieces a couple of times and then added the seasoning mixture.
From there, you just gently break it into smaller pieces to incorporate the seasoning without making it *too* crumbly.
It looked more crumbly than eggs (at least how I cook them) but the texture was soft and not dry at all. I could have kept bigger chunks, but I wanted the seasoning to be uniform throughout. I toasted a piece of Dave's Killer Bread (SO good!), added some vegan butter, then topped it with the tofu and some extra black pepper.
Black salt that's pink! I learn so much from you. This looks delicious.
ReplyDeleteI can't wait to read Jerry's post!
ReplyDeleteWow, I never would have thought silken tofu would work for a scramble. I always use extra firm. I add a bunch of veggies like mushrooms, onion, zucchini, bell pepper and spinach. I also haven't tried kala namak because I don't necessarily want an eggy taste. Usually just eyeball nooch, garlic powder, onion powder, turmeric, paprika, salt, pepper, and thyme. Glad your family is finding so many new recipes you enjoy :)
ReplyDeleteThis looks so good! I'm not much of a tofu scramble fan because of the texture of the tofu, but I've always only ever used non-silken tofu. And that always comes out so crumbly and unsatisfying. I always thought silken would just turn to mush. I'm so trying this!
ReplyDelete