Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Noodles

One of my favorite vegan restaurants, Wheel of Life, has a really fabulous glass noodle dish that I've been wanting to recreate. They use some kind of chicken substitue, but I used my new favorite way to cook tofu instead. I freeze and thaw some firm tofu. Then, I let the spongy texture absorb a diluted soy sauce and squeeze it out a bit. After that, I lightly fry the tofu in some peanut and grapeseed oil (I know...fried is bad, but I think that as a vegan, I don't really get that much fat in my diet...definitely much less than the average American...so I don't worry about doing this from time to time). When it's finished cooking, I take the pieces out and let them drain on a paper towel (to remove excess oil) The result is a seriously amazing little nugget that is just the slightest bit salty.

When the tofu is done, I reconstitute the bean thread noodles by letting them sit in hot water. As the noodles sit, I prepare the rest of the dish by re-using a bit of the oil that I fried the tofu in, and then quickly cooking the onions on a high heat. I add baby bok choy, and some more of my mung bean sprouts and let that cook a bit on a lowered heat. Then I drain the noodles and add it into the veggies along with some soy sauce and a touch of agave nectar. I put the tofu back in and that's it! Pretty simple and seriously tasty. My only issue with this is that I used yellow onions, and they turned out a bit sweeter than I would have liked for this dish. I will try this again with white onions and see if it makes a difference.

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