Pete's Food Blog

12. Sep, 2021

Firm (smoked) tofu Vegan

Ingredients:

500 g organic (non-GM) soy beans soaked in plenty of water for 12-18 hours

2 tbl whitewine vinegar

1 tbl lemon juice

Method:

Soak the organic soy beans in plenty of water 12-18 hrs. (Allow enough water for them to swell threefold).

Drain the beans through a sieve

STEP 1: Transfer a third of the beans (batch 1) - approx. 375 g to a food processor, add ½ litre of water and blitz for one minute. Then transfer the "soup" to a stick blender and blitz to a smooth paste.

Mix the paste with a further half litre of water and pour into a sieve lined with a muslin cheese cloth. Once the pulp is almost dry, stir it a little and "wash" through with another 600 ml of water.

Repeat STEP 1 for the remaining two batches.

Finally, squeeze as much milk as you can out of the muslin pulp.

Bring the soyamilk to a boil, stirring to avoid burning the bottom of the pan (be careful, it boils over easily). Then simmer for 20 mins. at 97°C. Remove from the heat and let it cool to 85°C.

Mix together the vinegar, lemon juice and 240 ml of water.

Very gently, stir in the acid, little by little until the milk curdles and coagulates. The top of the pan should become clear liquid when you stop stirring. You will most probably not need to use all of the acid. Stop adding it as soon as the separation has occured.

Let the pan stand a few minutes, then gently press a fine sieve into the pan and scoop out of the sieve the clear liquid with a ladle or dl measuring cup.

Pour the curds into a sieve and let them drain a few minutes.

Transfer the solids to your mould lined again with a muslin cloth. (The first time I used a saucepan steamer for this- one with holes in the bottom. Since then I have made a mould, the same size as a house-brick).

Fold the cloth over the solids and apply a weight to press the tofu.

Here we come to the tricky bit. There are many variables, the fineness of the bean soup, the amount of presure exerted by the pressing weight, the size of the mould and thereby the thickness of the tofu and the time left to compress. For soft tofu, 10-15 minutes may be enough; my aim was for firm tofu and I applied as much weight as I could muster for 50 minutes.

Once ready, the tofu needs to be soaked in water for at least 1 hour to help remove any acidic taste from the coagulant.

After soaking, it's good to freeze the tofu, this changes the texture somewhat to become more firm and with more "holes" that soak up the cooking liquids.

Smoking:

This is an optional step.

Prepare your smoker with four handfuls of chippings. Smoke the tofu FROM FROZEN, and start the 25 minute count from the moment the internal temperature reaches 100°C. Try to maintain a temp. of 150°C.

Once the smoking time has elapsed, transfer the tofu once again to a soaking bath for 1 hr.