tofu green bean szechuan stir fry

Bonjour les amis! We've really been enjoying our bountiful veggie baskets from Lufa Farms, one of the world's only commercial rooftop farms. They amplify the bounty with fresh and local produce from local farms as well. The baskets have provided a variety of veggies and as a result I have been inventing new recipes and pimping old ones (tomatillos in my bean chili--booyeah!) Moreover, I collect my box at the local Green Peace office, and the people there are so friendly! I often end up chatting with other neighbourhood folk collecting their veggies. It's nice to feel part of a community of good eaters.

Here's a yummy stirfry that I think really captures some nice Chinese flavours like sesame oil, spicy szechuan pepper, and the delicious salty kick of soya. It helped me use up the tomatoes, onions, soya beans and green beans that were in my basket.

The flavour culprits that comprise most Chinese cookery: sweet, sour, salty, and umami.

Mix 2 teaspoons of sweetener (agave, honey, sugar, etc), 1 teaspoon rice vinegar, 2 tablespoons of soy sauce, and 1 teaspoon of toasted sesame oil together, then taste. Does it taste like the makings of delicious stirfry? If so, you're good to go! If not, keep tweaking it, you'll get there. 

Once your taste buds are happy, mix 1 tablespoon of cornstarch in about a 1/4 cup of water.Mix those two together, then incorporate into the stirfry sauce, like so.

Now to get your spicy szechuan salt ready. If you don't have szechuan peppers, just add regular pepper or chili flakes, whatever you fancy to get your hot on.

It was my first time cooking with szechuan peppers, which actually aren't from the pepper family at all. They're some sort of flower pod. Neat! I toasted them over a medium hot flame and waited for them to change colour, stirring often.

I decided to turn my pepper into a pepper salt by crushing about 3 teaspoons of peppers and added that to 3 tablespoons fine sea salt. Now it's stirfry time!

The regulars in my wok: garlic and ginger, about 2 tablespoons each.

A pound of tofu, chopped up and sprinkled with salt and pepper.

A sliced onion and some chopped tomatoes will add some body to the stirfry (and use up some excess from the veggie basket!)

I shelled about a cup of fresh, organic soya beans and trimmed three big handfuls of green beans while watching bad internet TV (What Not to Wear--looking hot is all about showing your waist shape, apparently) while imagining that I was a farm girl in some parched and dusty town in the deep south, fixin' my vegetables on the front porch while mama was out back poundin' the grits.

Now for the actual stir fry process: are you hungry yet? First, fry the tofu in a bit of oil over medium high heat to cook t the cubes to a golden brown crisp.

I then added the soya beans and the green beans to the wok, giving a good stir occasionally. These greens were deceptively dense, took about 10 minutes to soften.

Next, the tomatoes, garlic, ginger, and onion went in. I wanted these flavours to stand out, so I added them last and cooked for about 5 minutes.

Remember the sauce you made earlier? Add that in now and give it a good stir. Sprinkle about a teaspoon of the szechuan salt mix and let that cornstarch in the sauce do its thing. Get everything nice and coated now!

You can eat this on rice or noodles, but I just had it on its own with some sesame seeds as a garnish. Oh, I probably added tons of sriracha as well.  The peppers made the stir fry taste quite zingy, without the burn of regular chili peppers, for example. I enjoyed the electric feeling on the tongue created by the szechuan peppers.

green goddess stirfry

So fall is upon us, as is the time for heartwarmingly delectable stirfries. This here recipe is taken from the People's Potato cookbook and comes highly recommended by my taste buds. What's especially tasty about this stirfry its heavy reliance on peanuts and peanut butter. Sign me up, son!
I used a variety of green vegetables: broccoli, snow peas, cabbage, and leek. Use whatever you've got, though! You'll also need a couple cloves of garlic, minced, and a dice sized piece of minced ginger. Use some protein, like this nice chunk of organic tofu.

Put on some music and get choppin'.



This bowl of condiments is what makes the stirfry extraordinary: awesome sauce
- 3 big plops of peanut butter
- 1 plop of hoisin sauce
- 2 glugs of rice vinegar
- hot sauce to taste

Start seasoning your tofu cubes with salt and pepper. Fry until golden in coconut or olive oil. Set aside. You could totally add the tofu at any time during the stirfry process, but I like mine nice and crispy so I do it first.

Then,stirfry your veggies in coconut or olive oil starting with the most dense ones. I added the cabbage and leeks at the end because I like to keep things crispy around here.

When everything is nearly tender; between 10 and 15 minutes of stirfrying over medium heat, add the garlic and ginger, and the awesome goddess sauce. Add in a few glugs of water and stir well. Garnish with peanuts and enjoy!

Happy autumn, everyone!

French Onion Soup

Can you feel the chill in the air? Why, just last weekend it was balmy and warm...September you fickle fool. I know what's coming though, and it's only going to get worse! The one saving grace about autumn is nature's bountiful harvest, and inexpensive, fresh and local produce. Although I enjoy visiting the Jean Talon market at any time of the year, it seems as though we are now in the apex of freshness and possibility.

I made a simple onion soup to keep the chill away on the first of fleeting fall days. Why is fall so short and winter so long?

The culprits in question: 5 onions, veg stock, thyme, butter, olive oil. Put these humble ingredients together and it makes a party for your mouth!

Methods I have seen used firsthand to prevent onion tears:

1) Wearing ski goggles whilst chopping.

2) Shoving a piece of bread inside your mouth between the teeth and upper lip.

3) Holding an unlit match between your teeth.

4) Keeping the onions cold in the fridge.

What I do: Nothing. I just cry through it. Enjoy the cathartic release, people!

After wiping away the tears, I massaged the onions in a soup pot with:

3 Tbs butter
3 Tbs olive oil
a few pinches of salt
a splash of water

Then it was time to sweat the onions. Cover with a tight fitting lid and cook over medium-high heat for about 10 minutes. When the water has evaporated, remove the lid and it's time for the best part: caramelizing the onions! They go from firmly pungent white strings to sweet, softly yielding golden filaments. All in one hour, while making your kitchen smell absolutely fantastic.

When an hour has passed, it's time to make these caramelized onions into soup!



Add 6 cups of stock. I used veggie bouillon cubes but I am sure this soup would work amazingly with a homemade stock. Then, add about a teaspoon of thyme and simmer for 15 minutes. I tasted mine and it was way too sweet so I added a tablespoon of port vinegar to impart some tang to the soup.

Ce n'est pas une vrai soupe aux onions sans le fromage et le pain! Yes, so we need some bread and cheese to finish this baby off. Some multi grain baguette and some emmenthal grated and over top and then broiled should do the trick!

Get that bread in the soup bowl and laddle your creation over top. There's something slightly subversive about wetting toasted bread. It expects to stay crispy but I had other ideas for it!

vegetable lasagna

What up people? I made a veggie lasagna and it was awesome. My friend Nicole showed me how to do this back in the day. She is an awesome cook. Here we go!

I was feeling lazy so I doctored some pre-made sauce with portobello mushrooms, zucchini and peppers. I had some withering tomatoes so that went into the sauce too. Always start by frying an onion and some garlic in olive oil, then throw in the veg and let it simmer.

Spinach and tofu for the lasagna filling. I also added fresh garlic and pesto, some soy sauce and some ketchup. Basically you want to think about what you could do to make the tofu as tasty as possible, since it's pretty bland when thrown into lasagna.

Looks like I put in some chopped red onion too. I don't remember.

Delicious riccotta wannabe!

Ready to assemble.

Prevent sticking by starting with a thin layer of sauce.



Then layer the uncooked pasta sheets over top, followed by some spinach mix and some sauce. Repeat til you finish with a last layer of sauce on top.

Finish off with some grated cheese. I don't use too much as I want to keep the grease factor down and I have even made this sans fromage with good results. Bake covered with foil at 350 for about 45 minutes, remove foil and cook until the cheese is nice and bubbly, about 15 minutes.

ass kicking tofu, peanut sauce and coleslaw!

Wow, has it been tasty around here. This tofu is a tried and true favorite for carnivores and vegetarians alike. I usually end up eating half of these little batonets before their intended use in stirfries, salads or my favorite--summer rolls. Try 'em even if you don't like tofu. Trust me.

How to resist golden crispness such as this?


The process begins. Start with a pound of firm organic tofu. For extra chewiness, freeze then thaw the tofu. Cover with some paper towel or a clean dish towel.

Gently press the excess water out of the block of tofu by weighing it down with something heavy.

Our star marinade ingredients: rice vinegar, dark soy sauce, hot pepper sesame oil. I've used just the soy sauce with good results so don't stress if you only use that.

Getting all coated up in here! Tofu doesn't need much time to absorb delicious liquid marinades...5-10 minutes will do the trick.

Then you need to get yourself some good tasting yeast, also called nutritional yeast. Note my mom's handwritten label, awww. Nice cheesy flavor. It's great sprinkled on salads and popcorn! It's a main ingredient in aux vivres dragon sauce if you are a fan of that.

Put about this much in a shallow bowl.

Get a tablespoon or 2 sized plops of coconut oil in a large frying pan and heat to medium.

Your tofu will be wet and ready to receive the sprinklings of yeast. Roll it around to get it all coated. Do not read too much into the previous two sentences.

Transfer the yeast covered tofu sticks to the hot, oiled pan like so. Let them brown on each side and when they seem crispy, stiff and golden they're ready.


What are you gonna eat this with? Well, a stick shaped food just begs to be dipped right? Right. Here comes the peanut sauce. I didn't realize how easy and addictive this is, beware.


You will need: 2 plops of peanut butter, 1 plop of hoisin sauce, 2 cloves minced garlic, a wee squirt of hot sauce and water. If you want to get fancy you can infuse the water with kaffir lime leaves, or chilis, or whatever turns you on. Use warm water (or microwave) to melt ingredients together. Add enough water to make a dip-like consistency: not too thick, but thick enough to still stick to whatever you're dipping.



You could serve the tofu with a nice Asian flavored slaw. Have I mentioned how much I love purple cabbage? So beautiful, so healthy, so inexpensive!

This is all you need for a wonderful tasty slaw.

So pretty.

Hello dressing ingredients! Some are missing though. You'll also need sugar and salt. But they don't photograph well, so I forgot about them.

The measurements are a bit iffy (if you don't know me by now...well just google a similar recipe or something). I'd say about 1/2 cup of oil of which the sesame oil makes up 2 tablespoons, a little over a 1/4 cup of rice vinegar (you can use lemon or lime juice too, or a combination thereof), a scant 1/4 cup of sugar and about 2 teaspoons of salt. Play around with the flavors until it is sweet yet tangy.

Bon appétit!