Beancurd with Mushrooms

As the weather gets colder, we’re turning away from our old standby, Chilled Beancurd with Soy Sauce, and thinking of warmer dishes. This is a quick tofu dish that exactly suits that purpose and can easily be made vegan. If fresh mushrooms are not available, you can use 6-8 dried shiitakes, rehydrated in hot water [...]

Chilled Beancurd with Soy Sauce

This is the simplest of cold dishes and a great source of protein for a vegetarian meal. Tofu is one food our daughter has loved since she was just starting on solid foods – she hated pureed food and demanded something with a bit of texture, so she probably ate tofu just about every day [...]

Asparagus with “Hollandaise”

Must be spring: asparagus is flooding the farmers’ market in SoCal, so I hope things are warming up in the rest of the country, too! Here’s a twist on asparagus served with hollandaise – it’s certainly lower in fat than that classic sauce and adds some protein to a vegetarian meal. Just remember cooking the [...]

Daikon Omelet

Here’s a simple variation of the Chinese Omelet recipe using daikon. My kids joke that you could kill someone with the daikon we find at the farmers’ market here in Southern California – they can be absolutely huge! I would recommend seeking out the smaller ones for this sort of dish and reserve the larger [...]

Chinese Omelet

Best known as Egg Fooyung, this dish used to be on most Chinese restaurant menus, although I haven’t seen it offered recently. In Mandarin it is called furong dan, or hibiscus or lotus flower eggs. It can be made with egg whites or whole eggs and can contain a variety of ingredients, ranging from ground pork to [...]

Kungpao Tofu (or Chicken or Shrimp or…)

This is another dish that probably shows up on most Chinese restaurants in America. It really is for the die-hard fire-eaters, but even they should leave the chilies on the plate and just enjoy the rest of the dish! You can substitute shrimp or chicken for the tofu and cashews for the peanuts (see the [...]

Mooshu Vegetables (or Pork or Beef or Chicken or Shrimp or…)

“Mooshu” will never be the same after Disney’s character (voiced by the hilarious Eddie Murphy) in Mulan, but Mooshu (also spelled moo shu, moo shi, or mu xu in Mandarin) is probably found in most Chinese restaurants in America. Its name appears to come from the dish’s appearance: the ingredients are basically cut into such [...]

Vegetable Stirfry Wearing a Hat

This is a super quick stirfry using vegetables that are in most cook’s refrigerators – you could also substitute whatever veggies you have on hand. A mandolin is a great gadget to have on hand for all the matchstick-sized strips you’ll need to cut, but you can also do it by hand – aim for [...]

Stirfried Fish with Eggs

This is a simple dish with an abundance of lean protein and a bright sunny color. For your most sustainable fish choice, visit Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch.
ingredients:

4 oz white fish fillet (I like to use Pacific cod or sea bass)
4 large eggs, separated
4 scallions, minced
2 tsp Shaoxing cooking wine
1/4  tsp salt
2 T oil

marinade:

1 tsp ginger juice [...]

Cashew Tofu

Not having chicken on hand the other day, I decided to make Cashew Tofu instead, and it turned out great. For this recipe, I would recommend using pressed beancurd, but this time what I had available was fried tofu, which is also a fun product to try, although certainly less healthful than the pressed variety.
Fried [...]