Thursday, August 12, 2010

bar food done right

Since I hate beer, I’ve always been more attuned to bar food :D

I’ve been seeing buffalo tofu popping up in the blogworld, notably in Tina’s blog. And it is just… brilliant. Even if I weren’t skeeved out by saturated fat, I have really never been a fan of slimy skin-on weird-tasting chicken wings. I am, however, an extremely big fan of buffalo sauce! And tofu, for that matter

I kind of winged my own recipe. (Oh my God did not even immediately realize the painfully awful pun I just made)

I began by pressing my tofu:

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Who needs some fancy shmancy tofu press taking up space in their kitchen when there are wonderful (heavy!) cake baking books?!

I let it do its thing for a few hours and then put it in my marinade. Since I didn’t have “buffalo sauce”, I thought about its spice, richness, sweetness, and tang, and just combined:

- 2 tsp. melted butter
- 1/2 tsp. brown sugar
- 1/4 cup hot sauce (I used Texas Pete’s, which is vinegary and not terribly spicy)

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Soaked for an hour or so.

Being apparently in a junk food mood, I wanted fries. But not potato fries. Squash fries! Another thing I’ve seen all over.

Took 2 largeish squashies, and cut them into french fry shapes…

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Then, as seemed to be most popular amongst the recipes I browsed, I got to breadin’.

The (single) egg I cracked turned out to have a double yolk! Those are so cool.

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Step two was a highly informal mixture of cornmeal (the most), whole wheat flour (slightly less), and breadcrumbs (like half the amount of wheat flour). Plus salt and pepper.

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Everyone got cooked together at 475 degrees for twenty minutes or so, flipping halfway through.

The tofu never got particularly crispy…

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But the squashies did! My mom said “Are you making squash fingers?” and I said “I was calling them squash fries, but squash fingers is way cuter!”

My squash fingers:

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Even when you are eating quasi-junk food, classy plates are fun!

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6 comments:

MelindaRD said...

Haha squash fingers, that is too cute. Nice name, I like it. The tofu looks great too. I may have to give this a try. Cookbooks are great for pressing tofu. I think I usually grab the nearest book.

Sarah @ The Smart Kitchen said...

I don't really dig beer...but I dig that tofu! :) It reminds me of this buffalo chicken pizza my stepmom makes that is better than any buffalo wing I've ever actually eaten.

Also, I would like to meet your mom.

And in the above sentence I first wrote, I would like to EAT your mom. I would not. Just to clarify.

Unplanned Cooking said...

Looks yummy. Keep meaning to play around with tofu but haven't gotten to it yet.

Megan D said...

I loove your homemade tofu press. And your wing pun. :)
Isn't it fun to makeover unhealthy foods like this?! Looks yummy!!

Jess said...

Just like chicken fingers and fries :) Hehe, LOVE this idea!

Rhea said...

That looks so delicious! I might have to try buffalo tofu soon.