Hey guys, so I know I’m usually much more generous with the notes here, but we’re kinda rushing out the door to go traveling. Taking the overnight slow train to Hangzhou (that’ll bring back some memories I’m sure), and then Shaoxing. 1. Mea Culpa #1: I… misspelled ‘Huaiyang’ at 2:02 in the video. Sorry about that, especially if you’re from the area. I was pounding away cutting this video together this morning and didn’t get time to check things as thoroughly as I usually do, for the reason stated above. That’s also why, if you’ve got an eye/ear for this sort of thing, the audio and color was a touch off in parts. Just didn’t have the time to be obsessive. 2. Mea Culpa #2: In hindsight, we probably should’ve chosen a bit more illustrative of a dish for pan-fried tofu - not something cut so thick and not flipped. Honestly boiled down to a miscommunication between me and Steph. I was trying to think of a popular tofu dish that’s purely pan-fried - i.e. without stir-frying it after. I suggested to Steph “hey, how about that street food tofu, you know, Tieban Doufu?” I (Chris) didn’t know how to make it, so when we were splitting up the recipes for the video Steph took the testing for that one. For a more ‘general’ pan-fried Chinese tofu, check out our old tofu frying video: ruclips.net/video/ZjOG8chNW-M/видео.html 3. Mea Culpa #3: If you caught it, we actually were deep-frying a rather firm tofu for the Sichuan Jiachang tofu. Here’s the thing - at our market, there’s both the tofu from the vendors as well as the boxed tofu. While we usually use the vendor’s tofu, we like to opt for boxed tofu for recipe testing. So for the Jiachang tofu, I grabbed a box of ‘Hakka tofu’ at the market (read: one that’s usually soft to medium) but… that brand was just WAY too pressed. So that’s why your tofu might end up looking a little different if you’re following the recipe. If you’re deep frying soft or medium tofu, yours’ll come out better than ours, promise. 4. Now there’s obviously some tofu products that’re pressed even more than firm tofu, of course. Dougan, the aforementioned smoked tofu, and so forth. I’m definitely not slagging on those ingredients - I actually quite like them, they’re just cooked in different ways. And I also understand that in the West sometimes all you get is a non-descript ‘medium tofu’ box, and you need to press it yourself in order to get the texture of firm tofu. I suppose I’m just against the mindless “buy a box of firm tofu? Prep it by pressing it!” mentality that’s seemingly… everywhere. It kinda feels like going to a restaurant and salting your food before tasting it. 5. I’ve gotten into arguments on Reddit on this very topic, and the common response is that “well, in the West, we just like it firmer and meatier”. If you just like it firmer… I’m certainly not going to stop you. We’ve all got preferences. I like overcooked root vegetables. Steph likes her toast almost burnt. My parents like their steaks well done. But what I’d argue against is the ‘meatier’ claim. When we cook meat we go to great pains to make it as ‘juicy’ as possible - brine, marinade, deep fry, guoyou, whatever. So why when people cook tofu do they go to such lengths to remove almost every bit of moisture they possibly can? You wouldn’t be mimicking meat… you’d be at best mimicking overcooked meat. 6. So I said that “if you’re aiming to mimic the texture of meat, use Seitan” (i.e. wheat gluten). Seriously awesome ingredient, whether you’re a vegetarian or not. To use it, first cut in pieces, blanch in simmering water for ~10 minutes, strain well, then toast in a dry wok medium-low flame til there’s a touch of browning. Super meaty texture. While if you fed seitan to people that’re food obsessed they’d probably be able to tell it’s not meat, I bet if you grabbed someone off the street it’d be closer to 50/50. 7. Interestingly, I was chatting with Steph and she was saying that oyster sauce and fish sauce are generally considered vegetarian here (?!). I still don’t quite buy it, but she knows her stuff better than I do. Ok, that’s all for now. Will be a bit less responsive than usual these next couple days while we’re on the road.
1.i like overcooked root vegetables, too. 2. I also considered oyster and fish sauce vegetarian. But not vegan. 3. Have a nice trip and come back with exciting recipes.
"if you're looking to mimic the texture of meat, use seitan" THANK YOU!!! FINALLY someone realizes Tofu isnt supposed to be like meat, it's its own beautiful thing :D
I think that's one of the main reasons why people don't enjoy Tofu. If you try to prepare it like meat it's gonna be bad. Tofu is great if prepared and cooked properly.
@Em Jay This, had Seitan at a vegan place my friend took me to. I wouldn't say it's 100%, but it's damn close and also takes the marinade really well. like would it satisfy you if you really wanted a steak no, but bbq and stir fry that stuff all day
Even as a white boy it bugs me when people compare tofu to meat or describe it as "meaty", especially when they're often talking about medium or silky tofu (medium is the only kind you can find in some places without alot of asians).
I d say it's personal preference, agetofu, Japanese deep fried tofu, uses corn/ flour coating before deep fried. Hongkong style has similar recipe and they taste wonderful!!
@@sdla690 you mean agedashi tofu? like you said, it's deep fried with a lot of oil. If you pan-fry, the corn starch coating will come off, stick to the pan, and get burnt before your tofu is cooked. different preparation for different techniques
@@wh0586 For 1. point: how is gmos any way shape or form a bad thing? How is modern genetic engineering any different from the genetic engineering we have been doing thousands of years? And the second point: I have heard this shitty ass argument before Xp m.ruclips.net/video/C8dfiDeJeDU/видео.html If I remember correctly there is an estrogen sounding compound in soy and this is why people think it is and works like estrogen. Considering how bad I your first two points were I am too lazy to debunk the rest and anyways why would you start with so horrible evidence to support your position.
@@wh0586 1. GMOs arn't thought to be harmful in anyway. All non-wild (and many wild) plants are modified by selective breeding, genetic modification is just a more specific variation. The real risk with GMOs is a lack of crop variety (making crop infection super risky) and various usage rights issues on seeds. 2. Phytoestrogen does not work the same as mammalian estrogen. Again, 'might' is a weasel word and not confirmation of harm. Reducing estrogen would also have a beneficial effect on breast cancer the same way that being castrated reduces various testoterone-related cancers. 3. Foods links to later-life diseases are extremely hard to disengangle from the diets of the people who eat them. People that eat red meat are more likely to smoke and eat excessively, so it's hard to establish the specific harm the meat does. Soy is obviously linked strongly with various asian countries, and probably a subset of people within them (e.g. vegetarians might have a higher soy intake than meat eaters).
@@wh0586 Pretty much all of you have written there is based on debunked science, pseudoscience and popular myths and misconceptions. The whole "Alzheimers and dementia" thing is particularily egregious, because soy and soy products are actually discussed as potentially neuroprotective. Also, why should I be worried about GMO foods? At worst, they are modified only to maximise productivity. At best, they are modified so we can use less harmful pesticides etc. or to be more nutritious.
My grandfather is from Puning 普寧 and the fried tofu dipped in garlic chive sauce is a family favourite. The only differences is that my grandfather made the sauce with boiling water. It’s a simple but delicious dish! Thank you for triggering so many childhood memories of eating tofu this way! 😀👍👍👍
This is an incredibly useful video! Thank you all so much for uploading this. I know I struggled a long time with cooking with tofu because it's different than a lot of stuff you cook with in the west. Plus it usually has the "health food" connotations, so a lot of recipes online are kind of bland or just phoning it in as a substitute. I'm absolutely going to try the pan-fry method! It looks so easy and I can imagine a variety of spice blends on it.
Totally. Originally I had little asides for each method to try to help get some creative juices flowing. Berbare? Creole? I think that version's a nice dish that can really feature a nice spice mix. Oh! One thing, I'll update the notes later. Something else we ended up cutting was a little discussion on how the street food vendors'll often chop up the block into pieces on the griddle then you can eat it with chopsticks or whatever. I think that's a nice idea for that one, as the bottom gets a bit harder than the rest and it can sometimes be a bit tough to attack otherwise. And yeah... I think tofu can be 'health food' in the sense that chicken breast can be. It's basically concentrated soy milk so it's not really intrinsically diet food or anything.
I looooove tofu and I love Chinese cooking, so this made my day! I would definitely love to see you tackle water-based or general non-fried methods for cooking tofu. Have fun on your trip!
#5 made so much sense after reading it. That is why it is so important to have this YT channel (and channels like this) to teach and explain the culture and cooking techniques of foods from other countries. I love your notes.... thank you for taking the time to teach everyone.... great videos
This is great! I love the recipes. Also I head the music in the outro and thought "Is that Broke for Free"? So glad that you credit the artist in the description! I love to see it!
I love this channel! It's so informative! I always get excited to see vegetarian friendly dishes. I would love to see more! I do still love learning about Chinese cuisine in general still!
I had a hard time getting the restaurant texture I'm used to with fried tofu and found out a lot of the restaurants in the USA freeze their tofu for at least 4 hours and then thaw before frying. Worked very well for me but I'm excited to try your techniques to see if they are even better.
on the one hand, that will probably work. On the other hand, I'd advise you not to use that on good tofu if you got any lol. Freezing ruins the texture of tofu (ice crystals puncture the water membranes) so if you're not buying for texture, there's no need to buy from like a tofu house or anything. Your local supermarket tofu will work just as well. Also opt for firm tofu instead of medium or soft. Soft/silken tofu really will just melt into slush if you thaw it from frozen. good luck
It's really good that you go for the tofu for the tofu! It's a fantastic ingredient and people still have this idea of trying to compare or try to turn it into meat.
Yay! MSG! Debunk the myth!! Frying tofu covered in cornstarch or actually potato starch is a very common traditional Japanese technique that is delicious!😍
I learned so much about tofu from this relatively short video. I can't believe I've been cooking tofu wrong this whole time! Please make more tofu videos. I didn't even know you could put it in soups!
So glad to have found this channel. Working at a jiangnan style Chinese restaurant, I spent a year watching the artistry of the chef and his assistant. And savoring the exceptionally delicious food of which they gave me so generously. Time has passed and they unfortunately closed. Ive been unsuccessfully trying to recreate it on my own. Finally my brutish attempts can end! Love this channel
This is amazingly useful, thanks. It would be awesome if you could do some Buddhist vegetarian Chinese recipes-it’s really hard to find any videos on the topic.
Most stir frys, fried rice, and recipes like mapo tofu are good for vegetarians. Not Buddhist anymore but spent a good amount of time living at a buddhist temple.
@@booairmow - I second their channel, however they are Korean Buddhists. I'd suggest Tibetan Cook and Himalayan Dumplings' channels for Chinese/Tibetan Buddhist recipes that are vegan & vegetarian friendly.
I really appreciate the logic you give to how things come together. I would love to see your pantry staples and how you rearrange basic ingredients to make meals for a whole week.
I MUST try these. I love tofu and am looking for new ways to use it and also facts about tofu. Millions of recipes out there~none about what tofu is, different kinds. Thank you Steph and Chris! Excellent choice for a vide o. I love it!
For the dip my mum always fries scallions (because Chinese chives are not available at our place) in the remaining oil, puts in some fish sauce + water. This works pretty well, too, even if it’s not as fragrant as using chives :)
Always more tofu! Here in the US we do not have many good resources for how to treat tofu in traditional manners. I know of some techniques because of my Thai family, but knowing more really helps me to showcase that Tofu is an ingredient that can carry a dish, not just a side or a meat substitute.
this is the first video on this channel that I have watched and am just commenting to say I was excited to hear you live in shenzhen because I just lived there for 4 years. have moved to the uk for university but my family is still living there. i'm not chinese but feel a connection to shenzhen specifically because of living there for that long (4 years is a long time when you're a teenager)
My wife is Sichuanese, the first time she tasted Ma Po Dofu in the US, she demanded to see the cook and after fussing at him, she wrote out how to cook it in Mandarin for him. She had a number of tofu dishes that were very popular with friends and neighbors.
Dang, could you share with the rest of us?? I'm Chinese American - grew up in Seattle whose parents' families fled to Taiwan during the Civil War. So we didn't grow up with Sichuan cuisine as here were no Sichuanese restaurants in Seattle back in the 80s and 90s. I'm still trying to learn as it's a food my wife loves, but not a regional cuisine I grew up with.
It's great that you address tofu in all its common forms. Over here in the States it appears all the tofu is in squares 2" thick and about 3 1/2-4" square pieces and firm, extra firm, medium, and soft. My favorite Cantonese restaurant uses a tofu in a dessert that uses a really soft tofu in a "soup" with a bottle of sweet ginger syrup on the side. I'd like to make it, but there's no comparable recipe in my repertoire. I wish that recipes used weights to specify amounts because "squares" don't really tell us much. In any case, I find that most recipes that are tofu based use much less sauce for a recipe than we (my guests) expect--same for Italian recipes and pasta.
Great videos. I've been watching them for a while. one suggestion I'd like to offer is that when you are using the chinese names for ingredients, could you please put the chinese characters and the pinyin on the page? We all have accents so by putting those up on the shot, we know exactly what you are referring to. It also makes it easier when we go to the store and try to match the chinese characters on the packaging with what you have talked about. Keep up the good work.
So yeah! Have you checked out the written recipes? We've got all the pinyin/characters there. It'd be a bit of work to have the pinyin/characters as text in the video itself (you need to make sure the text has a clear background that looks good), but I put in my narration word for word as CCs. I could start putting the characters in the CCs I think.
@@ChineseCookingDemystified, That's great. Where are the written recipes? CCs could work too. However for this video, they are a bit incorrect. I think you talk about "shirgao tofu, yanshui tofu", but the CCs say "sure Gaudio Phu Yen trade tofu" LOL
Here in the UK there's a tofu producer that seems to be cornering the supermarket aisles and their tofu is just like leather. They make a big deal out of their tofu being made to a traditional Japanese recipe and using nigari not calcium sulphate. I've tried several versions of this tofu and several cooking methods and ....... it still has the texture of leather. A week ago I finally decided that I'd had enough of their products so this video is very timely. Many thanks.
Wow! I REALLY found this helpful. Thank you. As I have been a "Tofu Affectionado" since about 1974, (as a new Veganiac), yet I never knew any of the details about one of my favourite ingredients. Xie xie ni! I'm about to leap aboard my e bike and head to Chinatown 2 of Toronto for a morning shopping. (We have 5 Chinatowns in the Greater Toronto Area.) No longer Vegan since the mid 80's, my weird "Fusion Cuisines" have really benefited from your wonderful presentations. I feel so much more confident, as I have seen so many of the ingredients you teach your viewers about, but until you, I hadn't a CLUE. Thanks.
It's interesting to hear the slight bit of accent you picked up in your time in China. You speak a little bit "sing-songey," and I find that kinda neat. As always, I love your videos! Chinese cuisine seemed a world away until I started following you. Super informative!
@@ChineseCookingDemystified Agreed. I think I'm just hearing some accent-building, either through practice and study, or by simple uptake. Either way, good job as always.
That little segment at the end had a much more pleasant audio this time around. Keep doing whatever it is you are doing with the audio it works a lot better now!
I am very interested in all forms of tofu cooking, it is a very clean form of protein especially for a late night snack when you don't want a lot of carbs. I got tired of egg whites. I found that Chinese chili oil in here in Minnesota, with those tofu frying methods that will be great. I like to make miso tofu ramen with Samyang spicy ramen and the chili oil for dunking, Chinese, Japanese and Korean all in one. Any other method would be greatly appreciated, tofu is very inexpensive around me (2 bucks a pound). Any sweet/dessert tofu would be awesome. I will probably watch this video a few dozen times at least. Thank you.
In Finland we often have new potatoes with a chive dipping sauce made up of salt, butter, chives, and the water the potatoes were cooked in. I'll definitely try this.
Literally every recipe I've ever read told me the exact wrong way to cook tofu. I'll definitely be trying some tofu recipes again now that I know why all my previous attempts failed!
Did the pan fry method today with Mexican spices instead. I'm never going back to two sided pan fry. The different textures and concentrated flavor at the top is a banger!
we use vinegar, soy sauce, chopped garlic and onion for the sauce for the deep fried one, you can also add sesame oil on the sauce or chillis if you want spicy, me i just go with vinegar, soy sauce, fish sauce, garlic, onion and then sesame oil if i have any kind of citrus it i'll also squeeze some too, it's crazy the flavor the tofu absorbs once you dip it in.
Haha I was deep-frying (1) the soft tofu (2) the Puning tofu (though I didn't get a chance to cut in that footage) and (3) the tofu for the Jiachang tofu. Lots of standing there waiting for tofu to fry, definitely a step that needs a beer on the side. Next time I'll rep the Tsingtao though haha. I drink the two pretty interchangeably, but I feel like Tsingtao's better out of a bottle.
That deep fried street tofu sounds really great. Something fairly simple to make and makes for great a quick bite. I am almost certainly gonna make it.
The stir fry looks amazing and quite similar to one I made the other day; The toban djan/Sichuan pepper combo is one of my new favourite things. Also, a somewhat radical idea I’ve had is to try and make an Indian takeaway style curry and sub tomato purée for chili bean paste, see how that goes
Your Vietnamese style sauce actually reminds me of Japanese Aburaage (deep fried and served with green onion and seasoned dashi fish broth or reduction). It all looks so good!
Chinese tofu seems more dense and just looks so perfect. I think the reason why Americans press their tofu so much is because our tofu is lower quality and often needs to be pressed or else it falls apart while cooking, or even before cooking sometimes. I've never gotten a rubbery texture from pressing tofu, only from overly frying extra-firm tofu. Being patient when frying tofu is the best advice though. It takes me roughly 20 minutes to pan fry tofu properly, and that's without prep and possibly stir-frying afterwards.
My fav is an easy tofu salad, use firm or medium tofu. Cubed. Toss with a dressing of soy sauce (most expensive kind you can find), vinegar, and sesame oil. Throw in some chives or spring onion too if feeling fancy.
Hey guys love your channel, left Shenzhen last year and dying for Chinese food lately. This video reminds me of something I ate quite often that I can't find the recipe for. It was cold tofu served with roasted chick pea and some black vinegar sauce as a side dish. But I can't get it right, what should I be looking for?
I don’t know how I was so lucky but I have a stump in my backyard that muer shrooms decided to make their home! Every rainstorm has me running to my stump to see if I have any new shroomies. If you haven’t had fresh muer, you’re missing out. They are less ‘woody’ than dried and more like crisp jello if that makes sense. 😂 They make such a great contrast to the smoothness of tofu!
Tonight I was introduced to a dish that the restaurant called Shanghai rice cake, I think it may also be called Chao Nian Gao. Oval rice cakes, slivered chicken, onion, and cabbage stir-fried and tossed in a savory sauce. It was delicious, I am familiar with rice cakes in Korean cuisine but had never seen them on a Chinese menu. I would love to know if rice cakes are more common in Chinese cuisine than I anticipated and if so I would love to see a video sometime which featured them!
Totally, love Chao Niangao. I'm thinking that if we wanted to do it though we should probably start with how to make Niangao for sourcing reasons... which elicited a nice glare from Steph lol.
@@ChineseCookingDemystified Ha! It would be interesting to see the process of making rice cakes, I think I may just be lucky. I have some really decent local Asian markets where I can get most of the ingredients you use. Hope you're having safe travels!
I always remove the seeds from star anise and Sichuan-peppercorn. Then again, I usually don’t grind them. Sichuan-peppercorn seeds seem to have little flavor and unless ground they have an unpleasant glassy crunch...
I'm loving your technique videos in addition to the regular recipe videos. Have a good trip to Hangzhou and Shaoxing. Are you exploring ingredients? Will you be live streaming as you explore?
Isaac Plays Bass No live streaming or anything (that'd be tough on cell/VPN), but we'll be taking some clips on Steph's iPhone for the next video. The video I think I want to make is "What is Shaoxing wine and why is it in almost every Chinese dish?" A touch baity of a title but I think it'd be interesting. Then the following week we'll get back with regular recipes :)
I season tofu with garlic, onion, smoked paprika, chili powder, cayenne, turmeric, black pepper, salt, olive oil and a little mustard. It's sooooo bomb
The reason why you sometimes press tofu is cause in bog standard western supermarkets they’ll only have 1 type of generic tofu which is not that firm, it breaks really easily. They don’t have different kinds of firmness like at asian supermarkets
"If you're aiming to mimick the texture of meat just don't use tofu" is some of the best cooking advice I've heard. Would absolutely love to learn about those water based cooking methods :D
Regarding your objection to coating tofu with cornstarch. We frequently home cook extra firm tofu by first drying it out with paper towels in the fridge, then coating it in potato starch and letting is sit for a while to dry dry out together. We then shallow fry the cubes until crisp on all sides and serve it in a variety of ways, often with string beans and garlic tossed only with oyster sauce. The tofu is incredibly delicious this way with a crispy outside and soft inside. It works.
I love the second style the most. It's relatively common in Thailand except that the chive and brine sauce got replaced by sweet garlic and peanut sauce. The chive and brine could only be found in the South or really old restaurant now.
Oh, they use the chive and brine sauce in Southern Thailand? Who knew~ I only saw the garlic and peanut sauce in Thailand, never thought that they'd use this one too.
@@thisissteph9834 Restaurants in the South (not the Touristy South though) tend to do things the old way. Many dishes that disappear from Bangkok and Central Thailand could be found there. Some of older restaurant in Bangkok still use that style too but sweet garlic and peanut is the street style.
@@kaizerkoala Any non-touristy cities/towns in the South you would recommend? I love going to Southern Thailand but sometimes it can be difficult to avoid the crowd.
@@thisissteph9834 Hadyai (Financial Central of the South, some touristy... mostly Malay... Good for shopping and food), Trang (Arguably Food Capital of the South... close to some nice Island too), Nakhon Si Thammarat (Cultural Capital of the South). And of course, even in Krabi and Phuket.. the city center and the old town are still relatively less crowded than near the beach.
I really enjoyed seeing the different techniques. I looked through your videos for dry frying and didn't see one. Do you have a video on that? I've done green beans that way, but I had some cauliflower at a local resto that was next level. Really spicy but so much flavor and the texture was perfect.
Ooh, so much complicated stuff-this comment is gonna get long bc I have questions!!) Well, it’s all likely quite simple, but I found myself a little bit overwhelmed. I’ll be celebrating my 1-year veganniversary next month & initially, tofu was the only thing I really understood how to cook...after putting myself thru a very specific “tofu boot camp,” (during which I ate so much tofu cooked in as many ways as I could think of) (& read, watched,etc as much info as I could find) I finally settled on a tofu methodology that fit my kitchen, satisfied my texture-taste & that I found so fascinating. I now freeze my tofu, thaw it in the microwave & toss it around “shake-n-bake” style in my favorite marinade. Idk where I picked up the idea to freeze-then-microwave (quick freeze/thaw) my extra-firm tofu blocks, but here we are, & I’m always so happy w those meals! (Tofu is a little expensive right now, so although I could eat like 6 blocks/month, I’ve had to scale back to 2 or 3 blocks... oh well...). Initially, I found that pressing my tofu all rolled up in paper towels, squashed under the weight of my favorite hardcover books, was far too messy & especially time-consuming. Mostly messy...& yeah, I was really hot to get cookin so way too time consuming... I never wanted to buy a tofu press, & hey! I didn’t need one...just freeze it & quick-thaw in the microwave-that’s quick, easy & the texture is just fantastic! It’s kinda tough, really “meaty,” & you can take the thawed tofu & really wring it out in your hands w as much pressure as you got. It doesn’t break & you can tear it up & mix into your marinade, let it sit a couple of hours, then throw it in the pan. Thass’it, thass’all-EZ. This might hurt those purists it there who don’t want to even press their tofu...I sorta understand. But (!!!) I find myself spending so, so much time in the kitchen just prepping meals for the next week & although I love my kitchen time (I sing...loudly...so I’m not sure how much my neighbors love my kitchen time, lol...) so much that I don’t mind spending the hours it typically takes to get it all done (& done right.) Each time I’ve done tofu right from its packaging, I’ve found it too soft. I love the caramelized crispness that happens when I work w that quick freeze-thaw tofu. My favorite kitchen creativity is all about sauces & marinades, so it takes as long as it takes, I suppose. I like seeing how others do their tofu, so I learned something from this...by now though, I’m just too comfortable with my frozen/microwaved/marinated tofu flavor favorites to really try anything THIS new (new to me...). So: what’s the quickest, simplest way that you do your tofu? What’s the best way to marinate, then bake tofu in your experience? Is there a cheap & easy way to diy smoked tofu? I’m serious about these questions- there will come a point where I’ll need to up my tofu game, & I’d rather face it as a well-informed “sauce-boss-soss-bauce” than be afraid of switching up my techniques. Please advise bc I’m really curious!! Thank you!! ☮️❤️soy! (Too bad there’s no tofu emoji...🤷🏻♀️)
For those who aren't familiar, woodear is really cheap to find dried and adds a nice vegetable meat. I didn't know chinese scallions weren't optional; is that like tarragon and scallion at once I wonder? Also learned to seek perilla seeds and use softer tofu for frying. I personally love the dark rich flavor of nearly burnt tofu but I'm a freak for that savory dark flavor and nothing delivers it as precisely and cooking it beyond rubber to crunchtown. Convection ovens are a godsend, are they not?
We do have one video that uses Seitan! It's the Sichuan Chuan Chuan video. But yeah I think besides that we've only used it in the extra Patreon recipes.
I used to live in Shenzhen, Bao an district but worked in Xixiang and Longhua. I loved going to get street food and getting fried tofu with oysters, fried eggplant, fry bread, noodles, and Tsing tao or Snow beer😋😋😋😋😋😋
One of your vids was recommended under a Li Ziqi video and i am now obsessed! Do y’all have an Instagram? I’d love to see a local perspective of the area of China you are in, in photos and such. Plus I love food photos lol love your videos so much!
Hannah Gs Haha where we live would feel a lot more pedestrian than where Liziqi and Dianxi Xiaoge are filming. I think in the Oyster sauce video we had a clip or two of our apartment complex. We do have an IG! ChineseCookingDemystified but word of warning it's mostly food pics
You can sometimes get the ingredients outside of China. For ingredients that straight up aren’t available outside of China they’ll usually sub or just not do the recipe unless it’s interesting
well this is a misunderstanding. they want to make chinese food accessible, because it should be.. but theyre also being honest. if something is actually integral to the dish and removing it breaks the dish... theyll tell you
Hey guys, so I know I’m usually much more generous with the notes here, but we’re kinda rushing out the door to go traveling. Taking the overnight slow train to Hangzhou (that’ll bring back some memories I’m sure), and then Shaoxing.
1. Mea Culpa #1: I… misspelled ‘Huaiyang’ at 2:02 in the video. Sorry about that, especially if you’re from the area. I was pounding away cutting this video together this morning and didn’t get time to check things as thoroughly as I usually do, for the reason stated above. That’s also why, if you’ve got an eye/ear for this sort of thing, the audio and color was a touch off in parts. Just didn’t have the time to be obsessive.
2. Mea Culpa #2: In hindsight, we probably should’ve chosen a bit more illustrative of a dish for pan-fried tofu - not something cut so thick and not flipped. Honestly boiled down to a miscommunication between me and Steph. I was trying to think of a popular tofu dish that’s purely pan-fried - i.e. without stir-frying it after. I suggested to Steph “hey, how about that street food tofu, you know, Tieban Doufu?” I (Chris) didn’t know how to make it, so when we were splitting up the recipes for the video Steph took the testing for that one. For a more ‘general’ pan-fried Chinese tofu, check out our old tofu frying video: ruclips.net/video/ZjOG8chNW-M/видео.html
3. Mea Culpa #3: If you caught it, we actually were deep-frying a rather firm tofu for the Sichuan Jiachang tofu. Here’s the thing - at our market, there’s both the tofu from the vendors as well as the boxed tofu. While we usually use the vendor’s tofu, we like to opt for boxed tofu for recipe testing. So for the Jiachang tofu, I grabbed a box of ‘Hakka tofu’ at the market (read: one that’s usually soft to medium) but… that brand was just WAY too pressed. So that’s why your tofu might end up looking a little different if you’re following the recipe. If you’re deep frying soft or medium tofu, yours’ll come out better than ours, promise.
4. Now there’s obviously some tofu products that’re pressed even more than firm tofu, of course. Dougan, the aforementioned smoked tofu, and so forth. I’m definitely not slagging on those ingredients - I actually quite like them, they’re just cooked in different ways. And I also understand that in the West sometimes all you get is a non-descript ‘medium tofu’ box, and you need to press it yourself in order to get the texture of firm tofu. I suppose I’m just against the mindless “buy a box of firm tofu? Prep it by pressing it!” mentality that’s seemingly… everywhere. It kinda feels like going to a restaurant and salting your food before tasting it.
5. I’ve gotten into arguments on Reddit on this very topic, and the common response is that “well, in the West, we just like it firmer and meatier”. If you just like it firmer… I’m certainly not going to stop you. We’ve all got preferences. I like overcooked root vegetables. Steph likes her toast almost burnt. My parents like their steaks well done. But what I’d argue against is the ‘meatier’ claim. When we cook meat we go to great pains to make it as ‘juicy’ as possible - brine, marinade, deep fry, guoyou, whatever. So why when people cook tofu do they go to such lengths to remove almost every bit of moisture they possibly can? You wouldn’t be mimicking meat… you’d be at best mimicking overcooked meat.
6. So I said that “if you’re aiming to mimic the texture of meat, use Seitan” (i.e. wheat gluten). Seriously awesome ingredient, whether you’re a vegetarian or not. To use it, first cut in pieces, blanch in simmering water for ~10 minutes, strain well, then toast in a dry wok medium-low flame til there’s a touch of browning. Super meaty texture. While if you fed seitan to people that’re food obsessed they’d probably be able to tell it’s not meat, I bet if you grabbed someone off the street it’d be closer to 50/50.
7. Interestingly, I was chatting with Steph and she was saying that oyster sauce and fish sauce are generally considered vegetarian here (?!). I still don’t quite buy it, but she knows her stuff better than I do.
Ok, that’s all for now. Will be a bit less responsive than usual these next couple days while we’re on the road.
Can we see your face while you cook and talk?
Lmao “rushing out the door” proceeds to still write a novel. You guys are awesome.
1.i like overcooked root vegetables, too.
2. I also considered oyster and fish sauce vegetarian. But not vegan.
3. Have a nice trip and come back with exciting recipes.
Great video as always, please make some recipes using silken tofu and smoked tofu, thanks!
Looks awesome. I've been trying to cook more tofu after discovering how damn tasty it is, thanks for more ideas!!
"if you're looking to mimic the texture of meat, use seitan"
THANK YOU!!! FINALLY someone realizes Tofu isnt supposed to be like meat, it's its own beautiful thing :D
I think that's one of the main reasons why people don't enjoy Tofu. If you try to prepare it like meat it's gonna be bad. Tofu is great if prepared and cooked properly.
seriously western restaurants want to sell me a slab of shitty tofu for high prices and call it a meat substitute. Please just eat good tofu.
sometimes tofu is stir fried with meat and it's a legitimate dish - a foreign concept in the West because people only see tofu as vegetarian meat smh
@Em Jay This, had Seitan at a vegan place my friend took me to. I wouldn't say it's 100%, but it's damn close and also takes the marinade really well.
like would it satisfy you if you really wanted a steak no, but bbq and stir fry that stuff all day
Even as a white boy it bugs me when people compare tofu to meat or describe it as "meaty", especially when they're often talking about medium or silky tofu (medium is the only kind you can find in some places without alot of asians).
"tofu doesn't need cornstarch, tofu needs patience" - so much wisdom in such a simple video!
But they use cornstarch in the final tofu stirfry...perhaps not in the initial pan frying though
@@nickbanderson They use corn starch to thicken the sauce, not to coat the tofu, lol.
I d say it's personal preference, agetofu, Japanese deep fried tofu, uses corn/ flour coating before deep fried. Hongkong style has similar recipe and they taste wonderful!!
I've had corn starch style in Taiwan, HK, the PRC and in legit Chinese restaurants on the west coast. I prefer it.
@@sdla690 you mean agedashi tofu? like you said, it's deep fried with a lot of oil. If you pan-fry, the corn starch coating will come off, stick to the pan, and get burnt before your tofu is cooked. different preparation for different techniques
im very happy someone finally said something about people pressing tofu too much
Furby On Benzodiazepines eat shit
@@wh0586 For 1. point: how is gmos any way shape or form a bad thing? How is modern genetic engineering any different from the genetic engineering we have been doing thousands of years?
And the second point: I have heard this shitty ass argument before Xp m.ruclips.net/video/C8dfiDeJeDU/видео.html If I remember correctly there is an estrogen sounding compound in soy and this is why people think it is and works like estrogen.
Considering how bad I your first two points were I am too lazy to debunk the rest and anyways why would you start with so horrible evidence to support your position.
@@wh0586 citation needed
@@wh0586 1. GMOs arn't thought to be harmful in anyway. All non-wild (and many wild) plants are modified by selective breeding, genetic modification is just a more specific variation. The real risk with GMOs is a lack of crop variety (making crop infection super risky) and various usage rights issues on seeds. 2. Phytoestrogen does not work the same as mammalian estrogen. Again, 'might' is a weasel word and not confirmation of harm. Reducing estrogen would also have a beneficial effect on breast cancer the same way that being castrated reduces various testoterone-related cancers. 3. Foods links to later-life diseases are extremely hard to disengangle from the diets of the people who eat them. People that eat red meat are more likely to smoke and eat excessively, so it's hard to establish the specific harm the meat does. Soy is obviously linked strongly with various asian countries, and probably a subset of people within them (e.g. vegetarians might have a higher soy intake than meat eaters).
@@wh0586 Pretty much all of you have written there is based on debunked science, pseudoscience and popular myths and misconceptions.
The whole "Alzheimers and dementia" thing is particularily egregious, because soy and soy products are actually discussed as potentially neuroprotective.
Also, why should I be worried about GMO foods? At worst, they are modified only to maximise productivity. At best, they are modified so we can use less harmful pesticides etc. or to be more nutritious.
My grandfather is from Puning 普寧 and the fried tofu dipped in garlic chive sauce is a family favourite. The only differences is that my grandfather made the sauce with boiling water. It’s a simple but delicious dish! Thank you for triggering so many childhood memories of eating tofu this way! 😀👍👍👍
This is an incredibly useful video! Thank you all so much for uploading this. I know I struggled a long time with cooking with tofu because it's different than a lot of stuff you cook with in the west. Plus it usually has the "health food" connotations, so a lot of recipes online are kind of bland or just phoning it in as a substitute.
I'm absolutely going to try the pan-fry method! It looks so easy and I can imagine a variety of spice blends on it.
Totally. Originally I had little asides for each method to try to help get some creative juices flowing. Berbare? Creole? I think that version's a nice dish that can really feature a nice spice mix.
Oh! One thing, I'll update the notes later. Something else we ended up cutting was a little discussion on how the street food vendors'll often chop up the block into pieces on the griddle then you can eat it with chopsticks or whatever. I think that's a nice idea for that one, as the bottom gets a bit harder than the rest and it can sometimes be a bit tough to attack otherwise.
And yeah... I think tofu can be 'health food' in the sense that chicken breast can be. It's basically concentrated soy milk so it's not really intrinsically diet food or anything.
@@ChineseCookingDemystified I'm thinking North Carolina style barbeque dry rub :D
I looooove tofu and I love Chinese cooking, so this made my day! I would definitely love to see you tackle water-based or general non-fried methods for cooking tofu. Have fun on your trip!
This is an awesomely informative video. Loved it! Will have to re-watch a million more times to learn all that information 🤣
Simon and Martina I didn’t expect to see you guys comment on here
Hi Simon and/or Martina! Pretty sure the algorithm decided to recommend this video because I was watching your tofu pudding video earlier today! Lol
S & M: I see you guys peeping here. Kiss Dr. M for me.
#5 made so much sense after reading it. That is why it is so important to have this YT channel (and channels like this) to teach and explain the culture and cooking techniques of foods from other countries.
I love your notes.... thank you for taking the time to teach everyone.... great videos
Today I learned, Nigari (MgCl2) is different to gypsum (CaSO4). I always thought they were the same. They aren't. Thank you.
Gypsum is also a good bit alkaline. I find it too bitter.
This is great! I love the recipes. Also I head the music in the outro and thought "Is that Broke for Free"? So glad that you credit the artist in the description! I love to see it!
I love this channel! It's so informative! I always get excited to see vegetarian friendly dishes. I would love to see more!
I do still love learning about Chinese cuisine in general still!
I had a hard time getting the restaurant texture I'm used to with fried tofu and found out a lot of the restaurants in the USA freeze their tofu for at least 4 hours and then thaw before frying. Worked very well for me but I'm excited to try your techniques to see if they are even better.
on the one hand, that will probably work. On the other hand, I'd advise you not to use that on good tofu if you got any lol. Freezing ruins the texture of tofu (ice crystals puncture the water membranes) so if you're not buying for texture, there's no need to buy from like a tofu house or anything. Your local supermarket tofu will work just as well. Also opt for firm tofu instead of medium or soft. Soft/silken tofu really will just melt into slush if you thaw it from frozen.
good luck
It's really good that you go for the tofu for the tofu! It's a fantastic ingredient and people still have this idea of trying to compare or try to turn it into meat.
Yay! MSG! Debunk the myth!! Frying tofu covered in cornstarch or actually potato starch is a very common traditional Japanese technique that is delicious!😍
It is, but it's true it falls apart easily! It's good to absorb the sauce tho
Yeah, it's great to see some MSG love
I learned so much about tofu from this relatively short video. I can't believe I've been cooking tofu wrong this whole time!
Please make more tofu videos. I didn't even know you could put it in soups!
So glad to have found this channel. Working at a jiangnan style Chinese restaurant, I spent a year watching the artistry of the chef and his assistant. And savoring the exceptionally delicious food of which they gave me so generously. Time has passed and they unfortunately closed. Ive been unsuccessfully trying to recreate it on my own. Finally my brutish attempts can end! Love this channel
This is amazingly useful, thanks. It would be awesome if you could do some Buddhist vegetarian Chinese recipes-it’s really hard to find any videos on the topic.
Most stir frys, fried rice, and recipes like mapo tofu are good for vegetarians. Not Buddhist anymore but spent a good amount of time living at a buddhist temple.
@@fusionxtras why'd you quit?
@@tobsmonster2 religion in general doesn't really speak to me and I would prefer to be part of other communities where it isn't much of a focus.
@@booairmow - I second their channel, however they are Korean Buddhists. I'd suggest Tibetan Cook and Himalayan Dumplings' channels for Chinese/Tibetan Buddhist recipes that are vegan & vegetarian friendly.
That stir fry looks wonderful. I'd love to also see the water based cooking methods you mentioned.
I really appreciate the logic you give to how things come together. I would love to see your pantry staples and how you rearrange basic ingredients to make meals for a whole week.
I MUST try these. I love tofu and am looking for new ways to use it and also facts about tofu. Millions of recipes out there~none about what tofu is, different kinds.
Thank you Steph and Chris! Excellent choice for a vide o. I love it!
For the dip my mum always fries scallions (because Chinese chives are not available at our place) in the remaining oil, puts in some fish sauce + water. This works pretty well, too, even if it’s not as fragrant as using chives :)
Sounds delicious.
Awesome tutorial. The level of detail was perfect for the duration of the video. I learned a lot beyond just the dishes!
Always more tofu! Here in the US we do not have many good resources for how to treat tofu in traditional manners. I know of some techniques because of my Thai family, but knowing more really helps me to showcase that Tofu is an ingredient that can carry a dish, not just a side or a meat substitute.
this is the first video on this channel that I have watched and am just commenting to say I was excited to hear you live in shenzhen because I just lived there for 4 years. have moved to the uk for university but my family is still living there. i'm not chinese but feel a connection to shenzhen specifically because of living there for that long (4 years is a long time when you're a teenager)
My wife is Sichuanese, the first time she tasted Ma Po Dofu in the US, she demanded to see the cook and after fussing at him, she wrote out how to cook it in Mandarin for him. She had a number of tofu dishes that were very popular with friends and neighbors.
Dang, could you share with the rest of us?? I'm Chinese American - grew up in Seattle whose parents' families fled to Taiwan during the Civil War. So we didn't grow up with Sichuan cuisine as here were no Sichuanese restaurants in Seattle back in the 80s and 90s. I'm still trying to learn as it's a food my wife loves, but not a regional cuisine I grew up with.
I'm in uk right now watching your amazing cooking videos from my hometown shenzhen. How nice, really brings me home..
It's great that you address tofu in all its common forms. Over here in the States it appears all the tofu is in squares 2" thick and about 3 1/2-4" square pieces and firm, extra firm, medium, and soft. My favorite Cantonese restaurant uses a tofu in a dessert that uses a really soft tofu in a "soup" with a bottle of sweet ginger syrup on the side. I'd like to make it, but there's no comparable recipe in my repertoire. I wish that recipes used weights to specify amounts because "squares" don't really tell us much. In any case, I find that most recipes that are tofu based use much less sauce for a recipe than we (my guests) expect--same for Italian recipes and pasta.
That dessert tofu is likely tou hua.
Which still leaves me without a recipe and the REALLY soft tofu. But thanks!
Great videos. I've been watching them for a while.
one suggestion I'd like to offer is that when you are using the chinese names for ingredients, could you please put the chinese characters and the pinyin on the page? We all have accents so by putting those up on the shot, we know exactly what you are referring to. It also makes it easier when we go to the store and try to match the chinese characters on the packaging with what you have talked about.
Keep up the good work.
So yeah! Have you checked out the written recipes? We've got all the pinyin/characters there.
It'd be a bit of work to have the pinyin/characters as text in the video itself (you need to make sure the text has a clear background that looks good), but I put in my narration word for word as CCs. I could start putting the characters in the CCs I think.
@@ChineseCookingDemystified, That's great. Where are the written recipes?
CCs could work too. However for this video, they are a bit incorrect. I think you talk about "shirgao tofu, yanshui tofu", but the CCs say "sure Gaudio Phu Yen trade tofu" LOL
@@diulikadikaday they mentioned at the end i think
Thank you, I live in Chengdu and I love cooking Tofu, I eat it almost everyday. I will try some of your recipes
Here in the UK there's a tofu producer that seems to be cornering the supermarket aisles and their tofu is just like leather. They make a big deal out of their tofu being made to a traditional Japanese recipe and using nigari not calcium sulphate. I've tried several versions of this tofu and several cooking methods and ....... it still has the texture of leather. A week ago I finally decided that I'd had enough of their products so this video is very timely. Many thanks.
You folks are amazing, thank you so much for all these videos. After coming back from China I really missed true Chinese cooking techniques
Wow! I REALLY found this helpful. Thank you. As I have been a "Tofu Affectionado" since about 1974, (as a new Veganiac), yet I never knew any of the details about one of my favourite ingredients. Xie xie ni! I'm about to leap aboard my e bike and head to Chinatown 2 of Toronto for a morning shopping. (We have 5 Chinatowns in the Greater Toronto Area.) No longer Vegan since the mid 80's, my weird "Fusion Cuisines" have really benefited from your wonderful presentations. I feel so much more confident, as I have seen so many of the ingredients you teach your viewers about, but until you, I hadn't a CLUE. Thanks.
Yes!! More vegan/vegetarian variations/substitutions on classic dishes! Much appriciated
It’s not a substitute
Moar tofu is always welcome! So helpful to get tips from the culture that invented the stuff!
I love those instructional videos. Please make more on steamed/ boiled Tofu and also a Saitan video!
It's interesting to hear the slight bit of accent you picked up in your time in China. You speak a little bit "sing-songey," and I find that kinda neat.
As always, I love your videos! Chinese cuisine seemed a world away until I started following you. Super informative!
Cool vid, as always. Steph's English pronunciation is really evolving. Simply amazing.
Her English's always been outstanding, I think we're just getting a bit more comfortable in front of the camera :)
@@ChineseCookingDemystified Agreed. I think I'm just hearing some accent-building, either through practice and study, or by simple uptake. Either way, good job as always.
That little segment at the end had a much more pleasant audio this time around. Keep doing whatever it is you are doing with the audio it works a lot better now!
I am very interested in all forms of tofu cooking, it is a very clean form of protein especially for a late night snack when you don't want a lot of carbs. I got tired of egg whites. I found that Chinese chili oil in here in Minnesota, with those tofu frying methods that will be great. I like to make miso tofu ramen with Samyang spicy ramen and the chili oil for dunking, Chinese, Japanese and Korean all in one. Any other method would be greatly appreciated, tofu is very inexpensive around me (2 bucks a pound). Any sweet/dessert tofu would be awesome.
I will probably watch this video a few dozen times at least. Thank you.
Looking forward for on the water based recipes! I'm gonna make some of that stir fried stuff tomorrow
I love these videos. It's like taking a master's class in 10-minute bites. (Pun intended)
In Finland we often have new potatoes with a chive dipping sauce made up of salt, butter, chives, and the water the potatoes were cooked in. I'll definitely try this.
If you're a Celiac like me Seitan is not an option. I love your videos like this so I can expand how I use tofu..
"on the largest flattest pan that you have"
-hold my 120cm paella pan-
Lets fry tofu for 100 pax
Yes
Very interesting channel, love to learn from Chinese cooking, your videos is great thank you.
Literally every recipe I've ever read told me the exact wrong way to cook tofu. I'll definitely be trying some tofu recipes again now that I know why all my previous attempts failed!
Did the pan fry method today with Mexican spices instead. I'm never going back to two sided pan fry. The different textures and concentrated flavor at the top is a banger!
we use vinegar, soy sauce, chopped garlic and onion for the sauce for the deep fried one, you can also add sesame oil on the sauce or chillis if you want spicy, me i just go with vinegar, soy sauce, fish sauce, garlic, onion and then sesame oil if i have any kind of citrus it i'll also squeeze some too, it's crazy the flavor the tofu absorbs once you dip it in.
Wow thank you for the detailed video! I would love to see the water based cooking methods as well 🙂
Have a good trip! Greeting from Vienna
Top-quality video and commentary. Love it.
I originally thought that can of coke was part of the seasoning ingredients
I think it's a Budweiser.
@@theshawning you are right, thanks for pointing that out.
Haha I was deep-frying (1) the soft tofu (2) the Puning tofu (though I didn't get a chance to cut in that footage) and (3) the tofu for the Jiachang tofu. Lots of standing there waiting for tofu to fry, definitely a step that needs a beer on the side.
Next time I'll rep the Tsingtao though haha. I drink the two pretty interchangeably, but I feel like Tsingtao's better out of a bottle.
That deep fried street tofu sounds really great. Something fairly simple to make and makes for great a quick bite. I am almost certainly gonna make it.
The stir fry looks amazing and quite similar to one I made the other day; The toban djan/Sichuan pepper combo is one of my new favourite things. Also, a somewhat radical idea I’ve had is to try and make an Indian takeaway style curry and sub tomato purée for chili bean paste, see how that goes
Thank you so much for this channel. It has certainly upped my game when it comes to Chinese cuisine.
Your Vietnamese style sauce actually reminds me of Japanese Aburaage (deep fried and served with green onion and seasoned dashi fish broth or reduction). It all looks so good!
i like soft tofu on soups. the ones which melts when you try to eat them. (like mapo tofu tofu)
Chinese tofu seems more dense and just looks so perfect. I think the reason why Americans press their tofu so much is because our tofu is lower quality and often needs to be pressed or else it falls apart while cooking, or even before cooking sometimes. I've never gotten a rubbery texture from pressing tofu, only from overly frying extra-firm tofu. Being patient when frying tofu is the best advice though. It takes me roughly 20 minutes to pan fry tofu properly, and that's without prep and possibly stir-frying afterwards.
americans suck at making soy products
My fav is an easy tofu salad, use firm or medium tofu. Cubed. Toss with a dressing of soy sauce (most expensive kind you can find), vinegar, and sesame oil. Throw in some chives or spring onion too if feeling fancy.
Hey guys love your channel, left Shenzhen last year and dying for Chinese food lately. This video reminds me of something I ate quite often that I can't find the recipe for. It was cold tofu served with roasted chick pea and some black vinegar sauce as a side dish. But I can't get it right, what should I be looking for?
I guess the "roasted chickpea" is actually the Sichuan deep fried crispy soy bean?
I can’t believe how scary this video was.
It was utterly tofu-frying.
Terrible. Just absolutely terrible.
no.
i'd love to see more ways to prepare tofu! thanks for the video guys
I don’t know how I was so lucky but I have a stump in my backyard that muer shrooms decided to make their home!
Every rainstorm has me running to my stump to see if I have any new shroomies. If you haven’t had fresh muer, you’re missing out. They are less ‘woody’ than dried and more like crisp jello if that makes sense. 😂 They make such a great contrast to the smoothness of tofu!
Tonight I was introduced to a dish that the restaurant called Shanghai rice cake, I think it may also be called Chao Nian Gao. Oval rice cakes, slivered chicken, onion, and cabbage stir-fried and tossed in a savory sauce. It was delicious, I am familiar with rice cakes in Korean cuisine but had never seen them on a Chinese menu. I would love to know if rice cakes are more common in Chinese cuisine than I anticipated and if so I would love to see a video sometime which featured them!
Totally, love Chao Niangao. I'm thinking that if we wanted to do it though we should probably start with how to make Niangao for sourcing reasons... which elicited a nice glare from Steph lol.
@@ChineseCookingDemystified Ha! It would be interesting to see the process of making rice cakes, I think I may just be lucky. I have some really decent local Asian markets where I can get most of the ingredients you use. Hope you're having safe travels!
Very informative! Nice video
Water-based! Thank you!
I was scared there would be no liaojiu aka shaoxing wine in the video! Whew. Fear allayed. :)
I always remove the seeds from star anise and Sichuan-peppercorn. Then again, I usually don’t grind them. Sichuan-peppercorn seeds seem to have little flavor and unless ground they have an unpleasant glassy crunch...
This channel is an instant subscribe.
This is wonderful! Thank you for explaining every step clearly and concisely!
I've been waiting for this video my whole life
I like virtually every tofu dish. Thanks for the demonstration!
I'm loving your technique videos in addition to the regular recipe videos. Have a good trip to Hangzhou and Shaoxing. Are you exploring ingredients? Will you be live streaming as you explore?
Isaac Plays Bass No live streaming or anything (that'd be tough on cell/VPN), but we'll be taking some clips on Steph's iPhone for the next video.
The video I think I want to make is "What is Shaoxing wine and why is it in almost every Chinese dish?" A touch baity of a title but I think it'd be interesting. Then the following week we'll get back with regular recipes :)
Such good food 🤤
Thank you for the awesome vegetarian recipes! These look so tasty :)
That pork belly was NOT vegetarian!
I season tofu with garlic, onion, smoked paprika, chili powder, cayenne, turmeric, black pepper, salt, olive oil and a little mustard. It's sooooo bomb
Yes to the water-based tofu cooking methods, please! Thank you!
Once more, great recipe and great explanation!
Great video! I've been making all kinds of tofu dishes for years and learned a lot from this. Looking forward to your next tofu video.
yaaaasss I've been waiting for this
The reason why you sometimes press tofu is cause in bog standard western supermarkets they’ll only have 1 type of generic tofu which is not that firm, it breaks really easily. They don’t have different kinds of firmness like at asian supermarkets
"If you're aiming to mimick the texture of meat just don't use tofu" is some of the best cooking advice I've heard.
Would absolutely love to learn about those water based cooking methods :D
Regarding your objection to coating tofu with cornstarch. We frequently home cook extra firm tofu by first drying it out with paper towels in the fridge, then coating it in potato starch and letting is sit for a while to dry dry out together. We then shallow fry the cubes until crisp on all sides and serve it in a variety of ways, often with string beans and garlic tossed only with oyster sauce. The tofu is incredibly delicious this way with a crispy outside and soft inside. It works.
thanks for this! I've only recently gotten into frying tofu and this is so helpful
Thanks for this, your veggie recipes are always great. I would love to see some water-based cooking methods for tofu!
That 3rd one sounds super YUMM!!
been thinking about jiachang doufu a lot recently so this is very exciting to me! gonna pick up the ingredients tomorrow i think
I love the second style the most. It's relatively common in Thailand except that the chive and brine sauce got replaced by sweet garlic and peanut sauce. The chive and brine could only be found in the South or really old restaurant now.
Oh, they use the chive and brine sauce in Southern Thailand? Who knew~ I only saw the garlic and peanut sauce in Thailand, never thought that they'd use this one too.
@@thisissteph9834 Restaurants in the South (not the Touristy South though) tend to do things the old way. Many dishes that disappear from Bangkok and Central Thailand could be found there. Some of older restaurant in Bangkok still use that style too but sweet garlic and peanut is the street style.
@@kaizerkoala Any non-touristy cities/towns in the South you would recommend? I love going to Southern Thailand but sometimes it can be difficult to avoid the crowd.
@@thisissteph9834 Hadyai (Financial Central of the South, some touristy... mostly Malay... Good for shopping and food), Trang (Arguably Food Capital of the South... close to some nice Island too), Nakhon Si Thammarat (Cultural Capital of the South).
And of course, even in Krabi and Phuket.. the city center and the old town are still relatively less crowded than near the beach.
@@kaizerkoala That's awesome, thanks! Always curious about Trang, probably would check it out next time we're in Thailand~
I really enjoyed seeing the different techniques. I looked through your videos for dry frying and didn't see one. Do you have a video on that? I've done green beans that way, but I had some cauliflower at a local resto that was next level. Really spicy but so much flavor and the texture was perfect.
Yep, we got a dry fried cauliflower! An older vid, but great recipe: ruclips.net/video/8pw0wetWe9Q/видео.html
Looks beautiful, skillfully made, appetizing and yummy :-)
Ooh, so much complicated stuff-this comment is gonna get long bc I have questions!!) Well, it’s all likely quite simple, but I found myself a little bit overwhelmed.
I’ll be celebrating my 1-year veganniversary next month & initially, tofu was the only thing I really understood how to cook...after putting myself thru a very specific “tofu boot camp,” (during which I ate so much tofu cooked in as many ways as I could think of) (& read, watched,etc as much info as I could find) I finally settled on a tofu methodology that fit my kitchen, satisfied my texture-taste & that I found so fascinating. I now freeze my tofu, thaw it in the microwave & toss it around “shake-n-bake” style in my favorite marinade. Idk where I picked up the idea to freeze-then-microwave (quick freeze/thaw) my extra-firm tofu blocks, but here we are, & I’m always so happy w those meals! (Tofu is a little expensive right now, so although I could eat like 6 blocks/month, I’ve had to scale back to 2 or 3 blocks... oh well...).
Initially, I found that pressing my tofu all rolled up in paper towels, squashed under the weight of my favorite hardcover books, was far too messy & especially time-consuming. Mostly messy...& yeah, I was really hot to get cookin so way too time consuming... I never wanted to buy a tofu press, & hey! I didn’t need one...just freeze it & quick-thaw in the microwave-that’s quick, easy & the texture is just fantastic! It’s kinda tough, really “meaty,” & you can take the thawed tofu & really wring it out in your hands w as much pressure as you got. It doesn’t break & you can tear it up & mix into your marinade, let it sit a couple of hours, then throw it in the pan. Thass’it, thass’all-EZ.
This might hurt those purists it there who don’t want to even press their tofu...I sorta understand. But (!!!) I find myself spending so, so much time in the kitchen just prepping meals for the next week & although I love my kitchen time (I sing...loudly...so I’m not sure how much my neighbors love my kitchen time, lol...) so much that I don’t mind spending the hours it typically takes to get it all done (& done right.)
Each time I’ve done tofu right from its packaging, I’ve found it too soft. I love the caramelized crispness that happens when I work w that quick freeze-thaw tofu. My favorite kitchen creativity is all about sauces & marinades, so it takes as long as it takes, I suppose.
I like seeing how others do their tofu, so I learned something from this...by now though, I’m just too comfortable with my frozen/microwaved/marinated tofu flavor favorites to really try anything THIS new (new to me...).
So: what’s the quickest, simplest way that you do your tofu? What’s the best way to marinate, then bake tofu in your experience? Is there a cheap & easy way to diy smoked tofu?
I’m serious about these questions- there will come a point where I’ll need to up my tofu game, & I’d rather face it as a well-informed “sauce-boss-soss-bauce” than be afraid of switching up my techniques. Please advise bc I’m really curious!! Thank you!!
☮️❤️soy! (Too bad there’s no tofu emoji...🤷🏻♀️)
You're like the Binging With Babish of Chinese food. So informative! love it!
For those who aren't familiar, woodear is really cheap to find dried and adds a nice vegetable meat. I didn't know chinese scallions weren't optional; is that like tarragon and scallion at once I wonder? Also learned to seek perilla seeds and use softer tofu for frying. I personally love the dark rich flavor of nearly burnt tofu but I'm a freak for that savory dark flavor and nothing delivers it as precisely and cooking it beyond rubber to crunchtown. Convection ovens are a godsend, are they not?
THANK YOU FOR THE VEGETARIAN EPISODE!
Would you consider doing some seitan recipes?
Ya! Also maybe bean curd sheets? These are available in western asian markets.
We do have one video that uses Seitan! It's the Sichuan Chuan Chuan video. But yeah I think besides that we've only used it in the extra Patreon recipes.
I used to live in Shenzhen, Bao an district but worked in Xixiang and Longhua. I loved going to get street food and getting fried tofu with oysters, fried eggplant, fry bread, noodles, and Tsing tao or Snow beer😋😋😋😋😋😋
One of your vids was recommended under a Li Ziqi video and i am now obsessed! Do y’all have an Instagram? I’d love to see a local perspective of the area of China you are in, in photos and such. Plus I love food photos lol love your videos so much!
Hannah Gs Haha where we live would feel a lot more pedestrian than where Liziqi and Dianxi Xiaoge are filming. I think in the Oyster sauce video we had a clip or two of our apartment complex.
We do have an IG! ChineseCookingDemystified but word of warning it's mostly food pics
Chinese Cooking Demystified I love food pics!
Please I need the wet-based cooking methods for tofu. Sounds really gooooooooooood. Thanks for your wonderful channel ,)
Thanks for this informative video, I can't wait to try these out!
Chinese Cooking Demystified actually means "there's no real sub for this very specific, Asia sourced ingredient."
You can sometimes get the ingredients outside of China. For ingredients that straight up aren’t available outside of China they’ll usually sub or just not do the recipe unless it’s interesting
It's called demystified, not "everyone can make it" for a reason
well this is a misunderstanding. they want to make chinese food accessible, because it should be.. but theyre also being honest. if something is actually integral to the dish and removing it breaks the dish... theyll tell you
Fantastic video🙏Can’t wait to try