smoothies -- is yogurt interchangeble with silken tofu?

Is yogurt interchangeable with silken tofu in smoothie recipes? I am trying to find ways to add more tofu to my diet.

shorty wrote:Is yogurt interchangeable with silken tofu in smoothie recipes? I am trying to find ways to add more tofu to my diet.

yes, unless you prefer smoothies that taste good.

This is the single best use I've ever found for silken tofu:

Alton Brown's "Moo-Less" Chocolate Pie

With one of these pies in front of me, I have no problem downing a pound of sliken tofu.

You may also want to try adding a few spritzes of lemon to make up for the acidity of yogurt.

A friend made this fabulous recipe from Mark Bittman for Mexican Chocolate (Tofu) Pudding. He whipped the daylights out of the tofu to get such smooth texture. Be warned - it is VERY cinammony.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/20/dining/201mrex.html

I occasionally make sorbet with silken tofu and a few times I've accidentally over-processed and ended up with smoothie. The tofu is definitely detectable, but it's still a pretty yummy yogurt substitute.

Kennyz wrote:

shorty wrote:Is yogurt interchangeable with silken tofu in smoothie recipes? I am trying to find ways to add more tofu to my diet.

yes, unless you prefer smoothies that taste good.

This made me laugh. I'm with you, Kennyz.

Also, be aware that there is some danger (not a lot, but some) from eating tofu that you haven't cooked or heated through. Unfortunately I did find this out the hard way. I'm permanently back to yogurt in my smoothies now.

I adapted a Bittman recipe for baked tofu...I can post if anyone is interested.

Grits,

You are scaring me out of using uncooked tofu. Maybe I should stick to cooked tofu recipes.

Back in Taiwan, it is easy to find freshly made tofu from a street vendor, but over here, it is not the case.

shorty

grits wrote:Also, be aware that there is some danger (not a lot, but some) from eating tofu that you haven't cooked or heated through.

What's the danger? And is this for 'silken' tofu or for all tofu?
Typically tofu is already 'cooked' - unless you are suggesting contamination problems.

Fresh tofu makes for a fine breakfast - and unable to find doufu fa locally and before I start making it, I've taken to occasionally having the soft solken tofu with some (light) agave nectar.

Not only is it cooked, but it's also often pasteurized. I'm with sazerac. What's the danger inherent in tofu that doesn't already exist in meat, dairy, or vegetables?

eatchicago wrote:Not only is it cooked, but it's also often pasteurized. I'm with sazerac. What's the danger inherent in tofu that doesn't already exist in meat, dairy, or vegetables?

I think if you read my post you'll see I did not say there was a danger inherent in tofu that doesn't exist in other foods. I also said the danger was low. Yes, there can be contamination issues, which I found out after I did some research on the web. As we all know, you can get that with anything. Tofu isn't special but it is in a wet environment. I had an issue with fresh soft tofu from a store. I had changed the water for two days so it may have been introduced by me or something in my water rather than at the store.

I should probably say that I have one of the weakest stomachs known to man.

grits wrote:

eatchicago wrote:Not only is it cooked, but it's also often pasteurized. I'm with sazerac. What's the danger inherent in tofu that doesn't already exist in meat, dairy, or vegetables?

I think if you read my post you'll see I did not say there was a danger inherent in tofu that doesn't exist in other foods. I also said the danger was low.

Understood, which is why I asked for clarification. While you don't say it directly, as you can see by shorty's response, your post tacitly points the finger at unheated tofu as containing some specific danger.

Thanks for clarifying.

Best,
Michael

Huh, funny seeing this, I used to make tofu smoothies every day, now I make something I call a tofu treat.

Recipes - I made this up:

Tofu Smoothie:

9.5 oz tofu (or so - I buy 19oz packs from Chicago Food Corporation for 99 cents each, and it's GOOD)
1.5 cups orange or other juice
Two heaping serving tablespoons jam - this makes the tofu taste good
1 packet Emergen-C - or 1000mg ascorbic acid - my secret star ingredient, big flavor enhancer
8-10oz frozen fruit.

It's a pretty darn big smoothie though.

I stopped making these all the time, I scaled it down. Here's my "tofu treat". I read on the internet that Japanese people love tofu and jam for dessert, it's how I got the idea.

9.5 oz tofu
95 g (at least) jam - or go with the two heaping serving tablespoons
1 packet Emergen-C

I mix this up in a magic bullet. Or you could use a blender. You want it very well mixed.

I don't know about you, but I am looking for phytoestrogen. 9.5 oz a day works well for me. If I were a man, I'd think twice about eating lots of tofu....

Nancy

sazerac wrote:

grits wrote:Fresh tofu makes for a fine breakfast - and unable to find doufu fa locally and before I start making it, I've taken to occasionally having the soft solken tofu with some (light) agave nectar.

Grits -- have you had any experience with making dofu hua? I looked at some recipes the other day for making this from soybeans, but it looked complicated.

I think that was sazerac's quote, not mine. I've never had Dao Fu Fah but it sounds really good.

shorty wrote:Back in Taiwan, it is easy to find freshly made tofu from a street vendor, but over here, it is not the case.

Does Phoenix Bean Products sell retail from their factory on Broadway? If not, I know there are several smaller Dou Fu makers that do, but some of the operations do look a little scary (the fact that making bean curd is an inherently messy and smelly process, doesn't help).

Maybe Phoenix can tell you when they deliver to a store that sells their product fresh. They can probably also answer any health concerns. As I recall, Phoenix makes a softer kind of dou fu, that falls apart when cooking, but might be good for blending purposes.

Is there something that makes soy bean-curd more healthful than the soy-based dairy substitutes? Is it just a matter of less processing and fewer additives?

If the soy milk is pasteurized before the culture is introduced, and kept in sanitary conditions, I don't see that raw bean curd could be any more dangerous than uncooked cheese, probably less so.

Phoenix Bean Products
5438 N Broadway St
Chicago, IL 60640
(773) 784-2503

Guys, I need to apologize and dial back my previous post on the potential "dangers" of uncooked tofu.

Basically what I believe happened is that I got staph food poisoning from fresh tofu that I used in a smoothie (hence this topic triggered a very bad memory). I'm not sure where the staph was introduced. I did follow good handling and water changing procedures but staph is pretty easy to get into food. You can get staph food poisoning from many different foods, not just tofu. I was only mentioning it since for some reason I had never considered tofu on the same level as meat, eggs, milk, etc.

Heating food does not get rid of staph so this would not have prevented my issues. I had just seen this suggestion during my research on tofu when I was sick, but I'm not sure if it was necessary or helpful.

I realized this doesn't seem like "dialing down," but staph food poisoning is incredibly common. Tofu is probably much safer than many other foods, as I tried to point out before. For me personally, at this point I will buy tofu in pre-packaged cartons and use or cook it all on the same day, and then immediately refrigerate any cooked tofu. As always, your mileage may vary. There are risks in everything. As an example, if I really liked tofu smoothies in the first place, I'd still be whipping them up in the blender.

Here is an article I found in my research:
http://www.nytimes.com/1991/01/09/garde ... gewanted=1

I refrigerate all tofu, cooked or not. I have never seen unrefrigerated tofu, even "home made" at asian grocers is in big buckets in a fridge. The only unrefrigerated tofu I have seen was in those aseptic packs (and I bet even those say refrigerate after opening).

H-Mart's delicious in-house tofu has explicit instructions to refrigerate within a short period of time after purchase -- I don't remember if it's 1/2 hour or an hour. I don't know what would happen to it in that short a time, but it may be more of a flavor quality than a health risk thing.

I've bought their firm a few times and love it for ma po. A bit of a grainy texture, but great flavor, I think there's still some "beaniness" in there.
I'm pretty sure they have a silken too, but I haven't purchased it.

JoelF wrote:H-Mart's delicious in-house tofu has explicit instructions to refrigerate within a short period of time after purchase -- I don't remember if it's 1/2 hour or an hour. I don't know what would happen to it in that short a time, but it may be more of a flavor quality than a health risk thing.

I've bought their firm a few times and love it for ma po. A bit of a grainy texture, but great flavor, I think there's still some "beaniness" in there.
I'm pretty sure they have a silken too, but I haven't purchased it.

I went to H-Mart in Niles for the first time yesterday. The produce did not look fresh. Since the produce did not look fresh, I was not sure about the quality of the other items in the store.

The store that I got the tofu from did have it refrigerated quite well and I've never seen it unrefrigerated at any store. I was just pointing out in my post that you probably want to follow proper refrigeration procedures for tofu just like meat, eggs, dairy when you are handling it at home, even after cooking it.

I don't have an issue with the store I bought the tofu from and I would not hesitate to go there again.

grits wrote:The store that I got the tofu from did have it refrigerated quite well and I've never seen it unrefrigerated at any store. I was just pointing out in my post that you probably want to follow proper refrigeration procedures for tofu just like meat, eggs, dairy when you are handling it at home, even after cooking it.

I don't have an issue with the store I bought the tofu from and I would not hesitate to go there again.

Do you see much textural difference between the shelf-stable Japanese style tofu and the tofu in the refrigerator section? Recently I started buying the Japanese style tofu since they last longer.

shorty wrote:Do you see much textural difference between the shelf-stable Japanese style tofu and the tofu in the refrigerator section? Recently I started buying the Japanese style tofu since they last longer.

Shorty, were you asking about fresh tofu v. packaged tofu? I wasn't sure from your question.

Fresh tofu tastes better but packaged does last longer so that is what I get. I have some packaged firm that I need to bake up this week. I'll post the detailed recipe later, but basically I cut the firm tofu into squares marinate for a bit in soy sauce/honey/hot sauce, then place in a baking dish and bake until it starts to get really done at the edges. It goes well with rice and a vegetable for a low-key meatless dinner.

grits wrote: I have some packaged firm that I need to bake up this week. I'll post the detailed recipe later, but basically I cut the firm tofu into squares marinate for a bit in soy sauce/honey/hot sauce, then place in a baking dish and bake until it starts to get really done at the edges. It goes well with rice and a vegetable for a low-key meatless dinner.

The above is pretty much the recipe. I make the marinade, drain and pat dry the tofu, cut it into bite-size squares, and pour the marinade over it. If I have time, I'll let it sit for a half-hour or so in the fridge; if not, I'll just place the squares on a baking dish or jelly roll baking pan (something with a lip so the sauce doesn't run), and then drizzle any remaining sauce over the squares.

It goes in a 350-degree oven for about a half hour until the edges look a little brown.

This is based on Bittman's baked tofu with soy sauce, but he brushes only with soy sauce and doesn't cut up the block of tofu. If you play with the marinade ingredients and make the pieces smaller, it's much more flavorful and also cooks faster. For the "hot sauce" part of it, I use the chili garlic sauce from the company that makes Sriracha.

Since this is bite-size, you could play with the marinade ingredients to the point where a little kid would eat this.

I do a similar tofu marinade, adding a few drops of sesame oil and some chopped garlic and/or sliced green onions.

grits wrote:

shorty wrote:Fresh tofu tastes better but packaged does last longer so that is what I get. I have some packaged firm that I need to bake up this week. I'll post the detailed recipe later, but basically I cut the firm tofu into squares marinate for a bit in soy sauce/honey/hot sauce, then place in a baking dish and bake until it starts to get really done at the edges. It goes well with rice and a vegetable for a low-key meatless dinner.

If you like spicy foods, you probably sould like ma po tofu. This is my favorite way to prepare firm tofu.

leek wrote:I do a similar tofu marinade, adding a few drops of sesame oil and some chopped garlic and/or sliced green onions.

Sesame oil would be a great addition. I'll have to try that.

How long do you marinate yours for?

d4v3 wrote:

shorty wrote:Maybe Phoenix can tell you when they deliver to a store that sells their product fresh. They can probably also answer any health concerns. As I recall, Phoenix makes a softer kind of dou fu, that falls apart when cooking, but might be good for blending purposes.

Is there something that makes soy bean-curd more healthful than the soy-based dairy substitutes? Is it just a matter of less processing and fewer additives?

If the soy milk is pasteurized before the culture is introduced, and kept in sanitary conditions, I don't see that raw bean curd could be any more dangerous than uncooked cheese, probably less so.

Phoenix Bean Products
5438 N Broadway St
Chicago, IL 60640
(773) 784-2503

I found Phoenix tofu at my local Chinese grocery store (Tian Lai). In fact, I was able to find Phoenix dofu hua (extra soft tofu). We had dofu hua with ginger syrup tonight. It was really delicious.