Adventures in tofu

Tonight I had visions of hot and sour soup in my head when I decided to try adding steamed tofu to my leftover squash & broccoli soup. I've been trying to find ways to eat tofu that I enjoy, because there is just something inherent in tofu that I dislike. Not sure what it is. It might be that subtle flavor. It might be the texture. It might be something else, but what matters is that I can usually overcome this inherent deficiency in tofu if it is prepared in a tasty way. Tonight I had a protein craving, and since I am a pescetarian who can't afford to eat fish, I decided I'd do something with the chunk of tofu in my fridge. I also had leftover soup. I almost dismissed using the tofu somehow when I remembered that hot and sour soup has tofu in it, in fact many Asian soups do, and they are delish. So I decided to give it a whirl.

The first mistake was the tofu itself. It was super firm. Super firm is pretty gross. It is way too firm. Its sorta like chewy calamari. No bueno. I steamed it before adding it to the soup, hoping to loosen it up a bit and get it heated thoroughly. I crumbled the super chewy firm tofu as best I could intot he steamer basket and let it rip for 10 mins. I even added a hit or two of soy sauce, hoping to impart some flavor on the tofu.

Once the soup was hot and the tofu was steamed, I combined the two and let it come together for 10 mins or so on low heat before I ate it. And it was gross. The tofu was nasty. Whatever that little thing I sorta don't like about tofu is, it was in my soup in spades. It tasted awful, the texture was awful, it was a failed experiment. I ended up eating only half of the tofu and dumping the leftovers in the compost. No bueno, indeed.

I think I will come back to Adventures in Tofu again, probably in the near future. I want to like the damn stuff and quite often I genuinely do. And I have to use the rest of this damn block of tofu in the next few days, we're cutting it a litte close to the expiration date. I wonder if that had anything to do with the off flavor...