Easy Homemade Tofu~轻松自制豆腐

Good bye to the passed 2012.

Its a whole new year 2013. 

I am looking forward for a new and exciting year to come. I believe life is a journey of Joy, Hope, Faith ..... in God.I hope it is not too late, to wish all my reader,blogger friends and everyone out there

 'A Blessed and Good Health New Year ~ 2013'.

Forgive and forget what is not so good and bad in the passed and openly received a Whole New Blessed Year ahead to YOU and Your Love Ones!!

 送来迟到的祝贺..我祝大家有个..健康, 快乐的新年'2013'.

愿每一个朋友们都能用平常心去迎接美好的每一天..^^

Share a health food to kick start my first post in January 2013..Tofu or called bean curd..:D

用豆腐, 一种健康又很棒的食才来做2013年的开头. 跟大家分享自家也可以做'豆腐'. 还是两种呢, 白豆干和黄豆干.

 This is a dish 'Hakka Stuffed Tofu' that we always have when there is a special occasion or a festival celebration is on. It's my Mil's signature dish. Now she passed down to me :p hope that i can passed down to my next generation and share to everyone who love TOFU.
There are varieties of stuffing in the tofu, like prawn, fish paste but my mil's Hakka Stuffed Tofu is stuffed with mince pork. Some other ingredients like shallots, garlic, salted fish and some seasoning are also added to blend in the taste of the meat with the tofu. 
客家酿豆腐是我夫家的年菜..每逢过年,过节一定有的吃这道菜. 这道菜还是我家婆的拿手好菜呢!! 酿料很简单, 就只是肉, 红葱, 蒜米, 咸鱼和调味料. 简单把, 不过简单的来超好吃呢!!

Tofu itself is plain, soft and it is full of soy bean flavour. Even just plain shallow fried it and dip with ketchup or dip sauce would be so delicious. The last Dongzhi festival we are having this Hakka Stuffed Tofu, then New Year eve we are having it and again in this coming Chinese New Year. You will never get bored with this...LOL!!
豆腐有好多种, 有白豆干, 水豆腐, 黄豆干, 豆腐卜, 日本豆腐..哈哈哈..我自己都乱了(",)
豆腐用不同的方法烹调都好吃!! 只是清煎, 再粘上酱料就好吃的很了. 这次的客家酿豆腐是我酿的版本.希望大家在看完如何自制豆腐后在贴子的尾声看到食谱. 我家婆的版本在这
为什么回有我的版本呢!! 话说有一天家婆要酿豆腐, 忘了买咸鱼, 那我就换了虾米取代咸鱼..味道还蛮好呢!! 真是老王买瓜自卖自咵..不脸红~~(*UU) 食谱会在此分享. 不过要请大家多多见谅, 因为这贴子会很长咯..:p
This round of making this stuffed tofu, my mil had forgotten to buy salted fish so we substitute it with some dried prawn. The taste is just as good. 
Please get my mil's Hakka Stuffed tofu recipe here and my version with dried prawn will be at the bottom of this post...be patient ya :p because this will be a really long post..

You can DIY (do it yourself) your own tofu. Tofu also called bean curd, is food made by coagulating soy milk and then pressing the resulting curds into soft white blocks.  May be you will think, 'why DIY if i can easily buy them? :D Simply is because homemade is always more fun and you know what ingredients you are adding in your tofu :D  Making tofu is not hard at all although it seems like a arduous task :p But i am willing to bet you, once you got the hang of it you will love what you are doing and proud that you did it:D
自制豆腐特有趣呢!! 自己做自家吃很不错, 对吧! 豆腐的做法就是把豆浆点上卤水让豆浆沉淀,凝固(像豆腐花不过不滑的而是粗细..可看看Step 4的图片,就会 明白了) 做豆腐不难只是步骤比较多了点.

Things you might need are...
你需要的材料是:

• Dried soy beans, which is easy to get ... 黄豆,简单买的到
• A blender or a soy milk maker which you need to blend the soaked soy bean. Then really hot water is pour into the blended soy bean to acquire soy milk...豆浆机或是个普通的搅拌机(就打豆浆那种)
• A large pot for boiling soy milk and also as a holding pen for the curdled soy milk before it strained...一个大锅,来装豆浆
• Cotton cloth bags which needed to strain the soy plup away from the soy milk..干净的纱布袋,过滤豆浆用的
• Straining tools (a strainer)...一个过滤网(筛子)
• Thin muslin fabric cloth or thick cheese cloth, size of a standard handkerchief. (about 9" x 9")...小纱布像手帕大小,用来将豆腐花舀包上
• A wide chopping board and a pail of water for pressing the wrapped curdled soy milk to become tofu..**可到这共参考详情

Well this is roughly all the tools you needed 
Now let's start..:D

 For more soy milk from the soy bean, soy beans is split into halves to take away the skin. Anyway whole soy bean will do too. 

Washed and soaked 500 gms of soy bean for a least 4 hours. (water should cover the soy bean completely)

After soaking the soy bean, pour away the water and filled with 2 litre of clean water. Step 1..
1 +2 .. Blend the soy bean with a blender

3 .. Pour the blended soy bean into a large pot

4 .. This is the fine soy pulp and soy milk.

 After the soybean are blended, Step 2 that is expressing the soy plup and the soy milk. 
1. Pour HOT boiled water into the blended soy bean.

2. It will looks like this with lots of foam on top.

3. Scoop away the foam.

4. Scoop the blended soy bean into the cotton bag to express out the soy milk.

I sew my own cotton bag..my 32cm x 64cm. Any size will do as long as it can hold the amount of blended soy bean that you make.

Step 3 is to boiled the squeezed out soy milk.

1. Squeezed out as much liquid out of the plup at possible.

2. This is the soy plup..Japanese term 'Okara', chinese term 'dou zha '.

This can be added to make a healthy and full of flavor and fibre bread or chinese pancake.(will share about this later)

3. Soy milk squeezed out from the plup.

4. Boiled this soy milk. **After boiling, if you want soya milk you may stop here and enjoy your soy milk here as this is drinkable soy milk. Just add a little sugar and also pandan leaves while boiled to enchance the flavour. 

BUT if you want to make tofu please continue the following steps..:D to turn all the soy milk into tofu.

Step 4, Tofu is curdled soy milk. Soybean protein and oil are coagulated/curdling with an edible substances. For example i am using 'salted water' or Japanese call 'nigari'. It is a mixture of magnesium and calcium salts that is left over when the table salt (sodium chloride) is crystalized from seawater. (more details about nigari here)....Add 1 1/2 tablespoons of salted water(nigari) into a big pot and pour the boiled soy milk into the pot. Stir well and let it sit for 3-5 minutes and see the salt water (nigari) react. Wait and observe, if you see the look of the curdling is as above that means it is done. If you don't you may add a few drops of salt water, stir to see the development of the curdling. (normally i will drip the salt water onto the surface of the soy milk a little at a time, will stir and observe after each addition to see the developing of the curd. I might have to drip the salt water a few rounds depend on the curdling of the soy milk)

1. The soy milk starts to curdled. (first you can see little little bit of soy milk  curd appear on the surface of the soy milk and the picture above is already curdled and ready to be tofu.

2. Put a strainer on the curdled soy milk to press out excess liquid.

3. Scoop away the excess liquid.

**More salted water will make a hard and firm bean curd and less salted water will make a soft and silken which is most us love this very much.

Next step...wrapped the curdled soy milk in a piece of cheese cloth/cotton cloth/muslin fabric to let the curdled firm and shaped into a block/cube. 

1. we use a rack with lots of small square. (you can use a muffins trays or any thing that can hold and shape the tofu)

2. Lined the cotton/cheese/muslin cloth on the rack and spoon some curdled soy milk onto the cloth. (depend on how big you want your tofu)

3 + 4 .Wrapped up by pulling the opposite corners of the cloth to meet together, pull to tighten.

5 + 6. Turn the wrapped tofu around and tuck the ends underneath. Remove the rack.

Next step..its almost ready...^^

1+2.  Pressing the wrapped tofu. Put a chopping board on top of the wrapped tofu and put a bucket of water as weight to press the liquid our of the wrapped tofu. How long of pressing depends on how firm you want your tofu to be. I press for just about 3-4 minutes for soft firm white tofu and if you want a firmer tofu to make into yellow bean curd/tofu that will need about 8-10 minutes.
3. After pressing, it look flat and firm.
4. Unwrapped the cotton cloth.
5+6. This is the soft and firm tofu. Chinese call this (bai dou gan 白豆干) means white firm bean curd. 

**You can stop here and have it as soft and silken tofu. Use it for cooking 'Mini stuffed tofu chap' or Stuffed Tofu which i will share in my next post or just braised it with leek and tomato or turn it into a another type of tofu, that is the Yellow bean curd (huang dou gan 黄豆干).

Ingredients for yellow bean curd:
6-10 pieces white soft bean curd
450-500ml  water
1 tsp turmeric powder
1/2 tsp five spice powder
1/2 tsp salt

To do:

1. Pour water into a thick bottom sauce pan.

2. Add in turmeric powder.

3. Add in five spice powder

4. Last add in salted and stir to combine.

1+2. Stir to let it boiled.
3. Add in the white soft bean curd.
4. Let it simmer for about 1-2 minutes. 

1. Simmering the white soft tofu in the turmeric liquid.
2. The turmeric liquid will dye the white soft tofu become yellow and This is yellow bean curd. (no preservative, additives or coloring..how nice, right??)
3.Drain it on a wire rack.
4. This is it..Yellow Bean Curd.

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