Yaki-tofu-don, spicey browned tofu and vegetable dish, very delicious

Yaki-tofu-don ingredients

Lettuce and cucumbers over rice for Yaki-tofu-don

Yaki-tofu-don

Mexican hot chocolate cupcakes with candied hot peppers.

Candied hot peppers

More candied hot peppers!

Hello again,  today's post is about food.  The first recipe I am going to show you I call Yaki-tofu-don which is influenced by the chef that I work with.  This dish came about because we have a dish at work called Yaki-niku-don which directly translated means cooked meat bowl.  It always looked good to me so I tried to make a tofu version at home.  When I told Osamu-san about it he made it and added some different vegetables.  Then I got some other ideas for it.  It is quite far removed from the original top secret Yaki-niku-don. I make lunch for the employees where I work quite often.  I make this all the time.  Even people who are not vegan really like it. Also it is very easy and fast.  I put the rice on, and do everything else while it is cooking.  Everything is done by the time the rice is done cooking.  This serves 2 people with left overs or maybe 4 in one night.

The recipe is as follows...

1-2 cups rice of your choice, I prefer sticky rice
1 zuchini
1 summer squash
1 red pepper
1/2 yellow onion
1 carrot
handful of snow peas
about 1/4 of a green cabbage
1 block firm or extra firm tofu
some green onions
1 cucumber
romaine or spring mix
sesame seeds
mirin
Sea weed dashi
chili garlic sauce
soy sauce
flour

1. Cook as much rice as you think you will need.

2.  While the rice is cooking, slice the squash, zuchini, onion, red pepper, carrot, and snow peas into spears about 2 inches long.  Slice the cabbage into strips.  Also thinly slice some cucumbers with the peel peeled off in stripes, slice the romaine into bight size pieces, and slice the green onions.

3.  Get your pan with a little canola oil really hot!!

4. While it is heating slice the tofu into cubes.

5. Brown the tofu, when you have browned a couple of sides of each tofu add the vegetables that you have sliced and saute a little bit.

6.  I tried to measure this conventionally and the result was not very good so I will tell you how I do it normally.
     While poring swirl once around the pan with the mirin then immediately swirl 1 and 1/2 ish times around with the soy sauce.  Then add about 1 TBSP - 2 TBSP of chili garlic sauce.  Then just a splash of sea weed dashi.  Then sprinkle with about a TBSP of flour and toss or stir until the sauce is thick.  Taste and adjust seasonings.  Remove from heat.

7.  To serve put a little rice in a bowl.  Cover it with lettuce and cucumbers.  Then pore on the tofu and vegetables Garnish with sesame seeds and green onion.

* Mirin is a sweet Japanese cooking wine that I buy at an asian grocer it is not very expensive. You can make your own Dashi very easily with dried sea weed (Konbu) which you soak for several hours and then heat to almost boiling or you can buy that at the store as well. You can substitute red pepper flakes and garlic for chili garlic sauce.  It is also good with out the dashi but better with.

The next recipe is also pictured above way back at the top.  Unfortunately I have not figured out how to put pictures consistently where I want them.  They just appear wherever they want. Sometimes I can move them and sometimes I can't.  This recipe is for candied hot peppers.  The chocolate cupcakes pictured are spicy chocolate cupcakes with chocolate ganache garnished with the hot peppers.  I can't remember exactly how I made those so that recipe will have to wait but I thought I would show you an example of what you can do with candied hot peppers which are very very good.
* I forgot to mention the lettuce in the picture is not romaine it was a lettuce experiment.  I didn't like it romaine or spring mix are definitely your best bet.
1. Slice you favorite hot peppers into thin slices.

2.  Heat 1 part sugar and 1 part water on medium heat until sugar is dissolved and it is simmering.

3.  Add a few hot peppers at a time and cook for about 5-8 minutes they should not be mushy.

4.   Remove and let them dry about 1 hour.

5.  Then you roll them gently in sugar and let them dry about 4 hours.  They will be kind of crunchy.  My daughter whose recipe this is completely covers them in sugar in a bowl.

These are also very good dipped in chocolate which can be accomplished by melting chocolate in a double boiler pulling the peppers through it and letting them cool.

Another great thing about this recipe is I now have spicy simple syrup which is turning into very yummy rock candy in my refrigerator.

See you later!