Thursday, October 15, 2009

Peanut Tofu: Not Good Beginnings

I am not going to talk about my dinner tonight, since all I had was a smoothie (peanut milk, peanut pulp, banana, frozen cherries, agave nectar and chocolate powder), walnuts and my daily brownie. For some reason I am just not hungry and I have learned that when I don’t feel hungry I shouldn’t eat because it can really upset my stomach. But I do have a few things to talk about tonight.

The first is my new Oster blender. So far I have used it today to make the peanut milk for my peanut tofu attempt and the smoothie I had for dinner. This blender is far superior to the Magic Bullet, due to its size and power. The smoothie came together quite easily and I didn’t have to worry that if it ran to long the lid would stick. The peanut milk was also a cinch to make. And I am going to have to check how much milk I am getting from each cup of soaked peanuts, because I think it is more than one quart; which is what I expected to get. The nut pulp I am getting as leftovers is so fine it is like nut flour. I may have to try and make raw peanut butter cookies out of it. So am I happy that we spent the money on it, not really; however now I don’t understand why I didn’t do this sooner.

I also made an attempt at the peanut tofu this morning. Unfortunately, the attempt was a failure. I made the peanut milk, added the nigari and let it sit. Curds and whey did form, but when I poured it into the mold, it went right through the cloth that came with my kit to line the mold. Apparently the curds were too small. I went back to Pangea and looked at the ingredients again and noticed that they actually use two coagulants in make the Nufu Tofu, nigari and calcium sulphate. Not sure as to why they do this, but it appears this will not be as simple as we all hoped. However, I would think that we can duplicate the process or figure out another one that works also. I’ve sent an email asking for help to Brenda Wiley (she provided the tofu directions as Bryanna Grogan’s site) and am waiting for a reply. Hopefully she can come up with an idea or may even figure it out and let me know how to do this.

9 comments:

  1. Good luck with the peanut tofu experimenting. Your smoothie sounds delicious.

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  2. Hey, SB! Sorry the first peanut 'fu attempt didn't go very well. I'm still waiting on my starter kit; as luck would have it, I ordered an extra bag of calcium sulfate to go with the included nigari (the c.s. is supposed to add extra calcium when used as a coagulant, and I'm a calcium hound). I'll try both and post my results as they come along. Good luck with your continued efforts! :)

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  3. Sad that it didn't work out, but I look forward to reading about it and when you get your first batch!

    That smoothie sounds scrumptious!

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  4. Kate, I think my efforts on hold until I get some c.s. as well. I have done some reading that makes me think it is what makes the peanut milk coagulate correctly.

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  5. I thought I'd written this somewhere on your blog but I can't find it so forgive me if I'm repeating myself. I had an internet friend who successfully made the peanut tofu at home (she said it was a little soft). I have photo's too and she used powdered magnesium chloride. If you want the pics feel free to email and I'll forward them on (with what she did).

    Good luck! I hope you can get it to work! I tried with lemon juice and then when that did nothing I threw in vinegar. All I ended up with was the most disgusting peanut milk known to mankind :(

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    1. Dear Vegetation, I would like to receive the photos of your internet friend who successfully make the peanut tofu. I tried recently with nigari and got no results too.... thanks my email: internomag@gmail.com

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  6. Since I'm soy free, I am really intrigued by peanut tofu. I hope you can come up with a great recipe!

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  7. I love peanut tofu, but it really if a fine tofu. If you figure it out, be sure to let us know how you did it! I have been craving it since my last trip to japan. lol

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  8. Should it be roasted or raw peanuts?

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