This makes enough tofu for 4, so we have plenty of leftovers – they are very munchable and a nice addition to many meals.

The Herbed Tofu (serves 4):

• 500 g tofu
• 2 and 1/2 tablespoons tamari soy sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon each: smoked paprika, thyme, sage, tarragon
• 1 teaspoon brown rice vinegar
• freshly ground black pepper
• 3 cloves garlic, pressed
• 1 tablespoon olive oil

I first pressed the tofu – sliced it, wrapped in cheesecloth, placed a cutting board and a pile of cookbooks over it, and let sit for 15 minutes. Then I cut it into small-ish cubes (about the size of the tip of my thumb), heated the oil in a frying pan on medium high heat, and fried the tofu cubes until slightly browned on most sides. This takes about 10 minutes, and while the tofu was frying, I had plenty of time to mix together the seasonings (tamari through garlic).

When the tofu was nice and golden brown, I poured the seasoning mixture in the pan, and stirred it to coat all the tofu cubes. I kept on stirring until the liquid was absorbed and started to get brown, and removed the pan from heat. I let the tofu come to room temperature before adding it to the salad base.

The Salad Base (serves 2):

• 1 small head of new cabbage, thinly sliced
• 1 red bell pepper, sliced
• a bunch of arugula, chopped
• 6 sundried tomatoes, chopped
• a squeeze of fresh lemon juice
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1-2 tablespoons gomasio (Japanese sesame salt), or salt to taste
• 1 teaspoon agave syrup
• plenty of black pepper
• fresh basil

I just tossed everything together in a large bowl, added about half of the tofu, and sprinkled with some fresh basil.

I just used whatever veggies there were to be found in our fridge, and luckily the red bell pepper and edamame beans went really well together both in texture and flavor. Ginger juice can be easily extracted by first grating some fresh ginger and then squeezing it so that the juices ooze out. The amount in this recipe is an estimate since I didn’t measure, but I used what I got from a small piece of ginger.

This is what I had (for 1 large lunch portion):

• 1 bundle or 50 g soba (Japanese buckwheat) noodles
• 2 dl frozen edamame (fresh soy beans)
• 1/2 red bell pepper, chopped
• 10 Roman lettuce leaves, chopped
• 1 tablespoon shiro miso
• 1 tablespoon mirin
• 1 tablespoon brown rice vinegar
• 1 tablespoon soy sauce
• 1 clove garlic, pressed
• 1/2 teaspoon fresh ginger juice

First I cooked some water and poured it over the frozen edamame to defreeze them. Then I heated a large pot of water until boiling, added the noodles and the drained edamame, and cooked for 6 minutes. Meanwhile, I chopped the veggies and placed them in a bowl, and mixed together the sauce ingredients (miso through ginger). When the noodles and beans were cooked, I drained them and rinsed under cold water, drained again, and added to the bowl. I dressed with the sauce and tossed everything together, and my 15-minute-lunch was ready to be served.

A bundle of soba noodles.

This is a lunch salad I made for myself the other day, and we had the leftovers as a side dish for a few days after that. I love the combination of oranges and red onions, and the freshness of the fruit was a very nice contrast to the earthy flavor of kamut. I don’t see why kamut couldn’t be replaced with another less expensive grain in this recipe: wheat berries, spelt berries, or even whole brown rice would most likely be very nice.

Here’s what I put in my salad:

• 5 dl cooked kamut
• 1 orange, chopped
• 1 large red bell pepper, cubed
• 6 sundried tomatoes in oil, rinsed and chopped
• 1 red onion, thinly sliced
• 1 clove garlic, pressed
• 1 fresh red chili, deseeded and chopped
• juice of 1 lemon
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/2 teapoons salt (or more to taste)
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• freshly ground black pepper to serve

Kamut is a grain that requires soaking overnight and even after that, a normal cooking time is about one hour to an hour and a half. I cooked mine in a pressure cooker for 20 minutes, and then let the pressure come down naturally for 10 minutes.

After the kamut had cooled down, I just tossed all the ingredients in a bowl, and refrigerated the salad for a few hours before serving. It actually got better and better over the next few days, so refrigerating the salad overnight would marry the flavors nicely.

Right before serving, I crackled some black pepper over the salad. Very nice served with homemade crackers or a nice crusty bread and hummus!

This stir-fry is based on the Kung Pao Tofu recipe in The Asian Vegan Kitchen. I tweaked it quite a bit, but the essence of the dish remains: a stir-fry sauce with chili paste, soy sauce, sweet soy sauce, sweet miso, and sherry. As my version doesn’t have peanuts or cashew nuts in it, I couldn’t call it Kung Pao any more. As a side we had a Sweet and Sour Cucumber salad from the same book and some jasmine rice.

This amount of ingredients made about three portions.

Sauce:

• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 1 tablespoon sweet soy sauce (kecap manis)
• 2 teaspoons chili paste
• 1 and ½ tablespoons sweet (light) miso paste
• 1 and ½ tablespoons dry sherry
• 1-2 teaspoons lemon juice

Stir-Fry Ingredients:

• 3 tablespoons canola oil for frying
• 1 cm slice of ginger, crushed
• 2 bell peppers, diced
• 1 carrot, diced
• 300 g tofu, pressed and diced
• 1 fresh red chili, chopped
• ½ dl sunflower seeds, roasted
• ½-1 dl chopped chives and chive flowers
• 1 teaspoon sesame oil
• fresh coriander and chive flowers for garnish

I began by preparing all the ingredients – mixed the sauce, removed the seeds from the fresh chili, and chopped and diced all the ingredients. Then I put a wok over medium heat, heated the oil, and threw in the chili and the tofu, and fried them for a couple of minutes, stirring constantly. Then I picked up all the chili slices and the tofu cubes with two spatulas, and put them aside in a separate bowl.

I heated the oil remaining in the wok to high heat, and first put in the carrot and the ginger. After stir-frying them for half a minute, I added the bell peppers, and after another half a minute, the chives and the chive flowers. I stir-fried the veggies for about a minute more, and then poured in the sauce followed with the tofu and the chili. I stirred to combine everything, lowered the heat, and cooked it for a couple of minutes more. Before serving, I added in the sunflower seeds, stirred them in, removed the wok from heat, garnished with coriander leaves, and drizzled with sesame oil.

We decorated our portions with pretty chive flower petals. By the way, stir-fried chive flowers taste amazing!

One teaspoon of chili and sichuan pepper each don’t yet make a fiery dish, but it’s enough to enjoy the combination of their flavours. If you prefer more spiciness in your food, don’t hesitate to add more, but take it easy on the sichuan pepper if you’re not familiar with it – if you add it too much it starts to dominate the dish.

Sauce:

• 1 teaspoon toasted and freshly ground sichuan pepper (or to taste)
• 1 teaspoon dried chili flakes (or to taste)
• ½ dl dry sherry
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 1 teaspoon fermented black beans
• 3 cloves of garlic, crushed

Stir-Fry Ingredients:

• 350 g broccoli
• 1 red bell pepper
• a quarter of a leek (or maybe 1 small leek, we didn’t have more!)
• ½ kg tofu
• 1 tablespoon canola oil for frying
• 2 teaspoons starch diluted in 4 tablespoons water

First we drained and pressed the tofu. Then we toasted the sichuan peppers over medium heat on a dry frying pan for a couple of minutes, stirring them every now and then so that they would not burn, after which I ground them in a mortar. Next, I mashed the fermented black beans with a fork, and then mixed all the sauce ingredients together: sichuan pepper, chili, sherry, soy sauce, black beans and garlic.

Then we cut all the veggies and the tofu into small pieces. You could also cut them into thin strips, squares, triangles or whatever shape pleases you!

Now, we put a wok over high heat, added the oil, and when the oil was really hot, we added the leek and paprika first, stir-fried them for a minute or so, then added the broccoli, fried it for maybe two minutes or so, then added the tofu, and stir-fried for maybe a minute more. Next, it was time to pour in the sauce, cook and stir for about one minute or so. Then we added the thickener, and stirred it in. We removed the wok from heat, and served the dish with yasmine rice immediately.

Spring rolls are actually quite simple to make. We made them on two separate occasions. The first time we just fried them on a pan, and the second time we baked them in the oven. The following instructions are for the oven, but they apply to pan-fried spring rolls too. Just don’t brush them with oil, but put the oil in a frying pan instead.

This is what we used:

• ready-made wheat spring roll wrappers (we got them from Aseanic Trading on Kolmas linja)
• 1 onion
• 2-3 tablespoons canola oil for frying and brushing
• 1 tablespoon of crushed ginger
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 1 yellow bell pepper
• 150 g firm tofu
• 1/2 teaspoon chili powder
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 1 teaspoon raw cane sugar
• juice of 1/2 lime
• 1 teaspoon potato starch

This makes enough filling for about 12-15 mini spring rolls.

For the dipping sauce:

• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• ½ teaspoon sesame oil
• ½ tablespoon brown rice vinegar

First, we preheated the oven to 200 degrees Celsius, chopped the vegetables into small pieces, and minced the tofu with a fork.

We put a frying pan over medium-high heat, added 1 tablespoon of oil, and fried the onions for a few minutes, until they turned translucent. Next, we added the garlic, ginger, chili powder, and bell pepper into the pan, and fried them for a couple of minutes more. Then we added the minced tofu, and fried it for an additional two minutes or so.

It was time to season the filling with soy sauce and sugar. We mixed the sugar with the soy sauce, and poured the mixture into the frying pan, stirred it in, and removed the pan from the heat. When the filling was done, it was time to fill the rolls.

Assembling the spring rolls:

First, we wet the edges of the spring roll wrapper using our fingers dipped into a bowl of water. This helps the pastry edges to stick together. Then, we put a tablespoon of the filling in one end of the wrapper, leaving about 1 cm space between the filling and the edge.

Next, we folded the sides of the wrapper together, and started wrapping tightly from one end.

We kept on wrapping until we reached the end.

The first spring roll was ready to be baked or fried now. Next, we started from the beginning, doing two at a time:

Once the spring rolls were ready, we brushed them with canola oil on both sides, placed them on a baking sheet covered with parchment paper, and put them in the oven for 7 minutes. We ate our spring rolls with rice, dipping them in a sauce made of soy sauce, sesame oil and brown rice vinegar.