soy un perdador

tofu is made of soy, and soy is Spanish for I AM, as in "I am being so deep right now."  

Right, well I intended for this blog post to be about the meal I cooked on Valentine's Day, but what transpired was this: I had an elaborate dinner planned, then my reason for the season came down with a brutal case of tonsilitis, and then I mysteriously also ended up with a sore throat myself, and so postponed said elaborate dinner to instead make us the world's most nourishing broth which I then took terrible photos of, so the whole thing was a flop, really. (That is, it was a very pleasant evening, mutual ailments aside, and the soup was also very pleasant, it was a flop only in terms of being bloggable. Let me be clear lest I sound more obnoxious than usual!)

With that option unavailable to write about, it took me a while to get my act together, but to paraphrase Beyonce the god, I woke up like this: craving tofu. And so I made myself this rather incredibly good tofu and cucumber salad for lunch today and now here we are!

those flowers were just sitting there on the table when I walked in but nevertheless I'm gonna assert that coordinating your flowers to your lunch is a clear sign of success in life

I know tofu gets regularly maligned for being flavourless or unfun or the epitome of dull vegetarian eating, but in the words of Harvey Danger, if you're bored then you're boring. Let the record state that I think tofu is amazing. Fresh, chilled tofu is an actual joy, all cashew-mild and milky of flavour with a softly firm (yes, both those things) protein-rich texture and the world's most absorbent surface for whatever flavour you should choose to throw at it. Also deep-fried tofu is a revelation, but so is everything - I mean, probably even deep-fried socks would be palatable, so that's not necessarily an impressive fact.

This recipe mostly came out of my head, although it's inspired by a bunch of different things I've had at restaurants over the years. It's so cold and crisp and refreshing and even though the dressing is all salty and oily and sour, somehow the cool juicy cucumber and dense cubes of tofu keep everything very mellow and calm. Both sesame and miso paste have this mysterious, magical savoury taste which help spruce up the ingredients that frankly do need some sprucing, and it's all just very satisfying and nourishing and good. You could leave out the spring onion (by the way I think they're called green onions in America, for my readers in that neck of the woods) but the flavour is so gentle and a million miles removed from actual raw onion.

tofu, cucumber and spring onion salad with sesame miso dressing

a recipe by myself. I know using olive oil in the dressing is a bit out of place with the rest of the ingredients but it's all I had and honestly it tasted amazing so...yeah. 

100g firm tofu
half a cucumber
one spring onion
one tablespoon rice vinegar
one tablespoon soy sauce
one or two tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
two heaped teaspoons white miso paste
a pinch of caster sugar
one tablespoon toasted sesame seeds

Make sure your tofu and cucumber are well-chilled. Dice them both into small squares, about 1.5cm but, y'know, this is not a time for measurement accuracy. Just something smallish and squareish. Finely slice the spring onion, reserving some of the green for garnish.

In a bowl, whisk together the vinegar, soy, olive oil, miso, and most of the sesame seeds until it comes together as a smooth dressing. Tip in the tofu, cucumber, and spring onion, stir to cover, then transfer to whatever bowl you're going to be eating it from (if it's a different bowl, that is) and garnish with the remaining sesame seeds and green spring onion slices. 

this serves one, but if you can't work out how to increase it to feed more then...actually I cannot judge, my maths is hopeless, but seriously, it's pretty easy to increase the properties to feed more people here.  

my new flat is a bit cute, yeah?

The other thing to note about tofu is that it's aggressively filling. So even though this salad may not look like much, it is indeed...much. We've just ticked over into March here so it's officially autumn, but Wellington is so whimsically changeable as far as weather goes and today I'm disgustingly overheated so this was a perfect meal for the temperature my body is currently burdened with, however I feel like this salad would be perfect any time alongside roast chicken and rice; to take to some kind of potluck thing, or with noodles that you've maybe also sprinkled with soy sauce and sesame oil. On its own though: a perfect little meal. 

I just realised this is pretty much my first blog post that include photos of my new flat, which is fitting, since I moved in just under a month ago and yet still am not entirely unpacked. I've decided to see the glass half full and congratulate myself on being amazing at progressing very slowly and being incredibly disorganised. My new room is so dreamy though, and will only get dreamier as I firmly take myself by the hand and make myself continue to tidy it up and unpack fully. 

fairy light grotto (they're solar powered so hopefully I get to actually enjoy them, oh Wellington weather you're easy to poke fun at! But really. I hope I get to enjoy them.)

make up n stuff nook! Also there's nothing like the haunted eyes of Judy Garland greeting you as you wake up, if that's wrong I don't want to be right.

But really, it's now March 2015, holy wow. From February last year to February last month it was basically nonstop turbulent difficult times, and even though I'm very much in this quagmire of "what the heck am I doing with my writing and am I making my own opportunities and why won't endless flailing about wanting to write another cookbook afford me the ability to do just that" I am also feeling rather cloyingly serene and delightful about many things in life right, so watch out. Ya girl is quite happy. I mean, look how rapturous I'm getting about tofu.

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title from: Beck's shufflingly and charmingly dour song Loser. Check me out, making truly awful Spanish puns all over the place. Obvs Beyonce shoulda won that Grammy but this is a damn nice song and the opening guitar riffs are truly excellent. Nice work, Beck. 

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music lately: 

Let Me Be Him, Hot Chip. The chorus (or whatever it is, this song just kind of drifts) is so uplifting and pretty and dreamy and full of "Oh-ohhh" bits and it's just a lovely, lovely thing to listen to. Definite mood upswing stuff.

Eternal Flame, Joan As Policewoman. I've loved this song for years and years but have been listening to it over and over lately, it flickers like a candle and swoons and sways and the lyrics are so, so excellent. I love how soft and whispery and then deep and rich her voice goes. Oh yeah and also this is not a cover of the Bangles song which was later covered by Atomic Kitten, they just share a title, ya know?

The Killing Moon, Echo and the Bunnymen. Love a bit of tremolo, I do. 

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next time: I've made two batches of this Nigella coffee ice cream but I keep eating it all before I can take photos of it. If this trajectory is anything to go by though, there will probably be at least one more outing of the recipe in my near future so maybe that's what I'll blog about next!