三菇红烧豆腐 Deep Fried Tofu and Mushrooms

Pinyin: sān gū hóng shāo dòu fu

Recycled cooking oil has been a hot topic in the news the last several weeks. The China Daily published an article on just how bad recycled cooking oil is to eat and how much cooking oil is recycled in Chinese restaurants. About one tenth of the cooking oil in China is recycled totaling two to three million tons.

Cooking oil is reclaimed from restaurants and sewage drains and is then cleaned up and refined. It’s sold back to low-end restaurants that are able to cut their oil costs by about 5o%. Unfortunately recycled cooking oil contains high amounts of aflatoxin. Aflatoxin is 100 times more toxic than arsenic.

This tofu is fried, but I’m guessing I got fresh oil. I ordered this vegetarian dish one night when I was eating alone. Silken tofu pieces were deep fried and then a selection of mushrooms with asparagus and carrot slices was added in. A sweet yet savory sauce was stirred in while cooking and the dish presents well. Unfortunately the sauce was a bit too watery making the flavors muted. This dish has a lot of potential but something is needed to spice it up.

Here’s how to make it:

Ingredients:

500g Firm tofu
200g Shitake mushrooms (fresh)
1/2 Carrot (small)
1/2 Green Pepper
1 Scallion (diced)
1 small chunk Ginger (sliced)
2 cloves Garlic (minced)
3 tbsp Bean paste
1 tbsp cornstarch mixed with 1tbsp water
Vegetable oil

Directions:

Prepare the tofu by delicately cutting it into chunks and frying in oil and set aside.

In a clean wok add a bit of oil then add the garlic, ginger, and bean paste and stir fry for a minute. Next, put the carrots, green peppers, mushrooms, tofu, and cornstarch/water mix into the wok and stir. Cover and allow to cook several minutes until the carrots are tender. Finally add the diced scallion and serve.