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America doesn't know tofu

asteriskmag.com

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Re: America doesn't know tofu

#21

Post by Snow_Falls »

PoignardAzur wrote: post #18
chris-orgmenta wrote: post #11

I found this vivid, precise writing to be extremely enjoyable to sink into.

Asterisk magazine has much more vivid, down-to-earth writing than "bay area rationalist magazine funded by effective altruism" would evoke. One of the articles in that same issue was the one that pushed me to finally become vegetarian.

I'm not sure I can trust a magazine that has a grammatical error in title of an article on the front page.* Now this doesn't say anything about the quality of the article itself (who doesn't make silly mistakes) but it does speak to a lack of editorial oversight. These sorts of basic mistakes do not inspire confidence.

*bottom article on the front page: "Rarely is the Question Asked: Is Our Children Learning?" should be "are our children learning".

ps what is the article that convinced you to go vegatarian, sounds interesting

Re: America doesn't know tofu

#22

Post by em-bee »

Snow_Falls wrote: post #21
PoignardAzur wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Asterisk magazine has much more vivid, down-to-earth writing than "bay area rationalist magazine funded by effective altruism" would evoke. One of the articles in that same issue was the one that pushed me to finally become vegetarian.

I'm not sure I can trust a magazine that has a grammatical error in title of an article on the front page.* Now this doesn't say anything about the quality of the article itself (who doesn't make silly mistakes) but it does speak to a lack of editorial oversight. These sorts of basic mistakes do not inspire confidence. *bottom article on the front page: "Rarely is the Question Asked: Is Our Children Learning?" should…

given the content of that title it sounds like an intentional pun

Re: America doesn't know tofu

#23

Post by shafyy »

OJFord wrote: post #17
ben_w wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's tofu that melts? Huh. That (I thought) it didn't melt was the one thing holding it back from being a true vegan cheese[0] alternative to me. [0] Process for making {cheese, tofu}: take {milk, soy milk}, add some acid to make the proteins coagulate, then draw the rest of the owl to get your sliceable high-protein block of controllable firmness and flavour.

> [0] Process for making {cheese, tofu}: take {milk, soy milk}, add some acid to make the proteins coagulate, I wonder if anyone's tried adding lactose to soy milk and using cultures and rest of the process as if to target a particular traditional cheese. I'm not saying the result would be vegan, I don't know if there's a vegan source or way of manufacturing lactose, but just for interest.

I have had a plant-based cheese company for a while. Yes, adding casein (I think you mean casein, not lactose) to soy milk woulnd't be vegan. There are companies that try to create vegan casein with precision fermentation, but to my knowledge, none of them are doing it at scale (i.e. I wouldn't know where to buy such a vegan cheese).

Most cheese is not made with acid but with enzyme called rennet, which is typically found in stomachs of cow's for example. Now, there is synthetic rennet which is used in the cheese industry widely, which is vegan. However, rennet doens't work with plant-based milks. We've done a lot of experiments to find a replacement enzyme for rennet that would coagulate soy milk with a similar result as animal-based cheese, but didn't get any great results.

The cheeses made with acid are usually softer (e.g. ricotta). For a while we manufactured and sold a plant-based cheese made with soy milk that was very similar to ricotta. Not bad, but a far cry from the animal-based version.

I still think it's possible to find a way to make plant-based cheese without needing to synthetically create vegan casein. As other commenters have mentioned, many of the vegan cheeses currently available are based on either coconut oil, cashew, or almonds (or a mix of these). For some use cases, this works suprisingly well (e.g. if you live in Germany, get the vegan Feta from Edeka's own brand. It's the fucking best). But then again for some use cases, they don't (e.g. the melting behavior is usually not very good). I think they've gotten a lot better in the past 5 years and I don't miss animal-based cheese anymore as a vegan. I also think there's a local maximum here with these coconut oil, almond and cashew based cheeses though.

Edit: Confused lactose with casein, updated to reflect that

Re: America doesn't know tofu

#24

Post by hardwaregeek »

If you like passionate writing about chinese food, I highly recommend Fuchsia Dunlop’s new book, Invitation to A Banquet, which goes over chinese food in remarkable detail. Each chapter is devoted to a single dish or technique and it really goes in depth.

Re: America doesn't know tofu

#25

Post by brnt »

Sirizarry wrote: post #15
ben_w wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm aware of Violife; the trouble is, while it melts, it has zero protein — from the ingredients it's basically solidified flavoured coconut oil: https://www.tesco.com/groceries/en-GB/products/302277589 To me, a true vegan cheese alternative has to tick all the boxes that cheese ticks at the same time, not a separate product for each box you want to tick.

Im sorry but you seriously worry about the protein content of your cheese? There are plenty other protein rich foods

Vegans need to worry about this, because most don't want to eat piles of beans with every meal. I love beans, but I love other foods too!

Re: America doesn't know tofu

#26

Post by shafyy »

autarch wrote: post #10
ben_w wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's tofu that melts? Huh. That (I thought) it didn't melt was the one thing holding it back from being a true vegan cheese[0] alternative to me. [0] Process for making {cheese, tofu}: take {milk, soy milk}, add some acid to make the proteins coagulate, then draw the rest of the owl to get your sliceable high-protein block of controllable firmness and flavour.

There are vegan cheese products that melt. I like Violife brand cheeses when I want something melty.

Violife is my least favorite brand haha. In Germany, I prefer Simply V (both for melted and not melted) and Edeka's vegan feta cheese, which is absolutely bonkers good (always need to double check if it really is vegan).

Re: America doesn't know tofu

#27

Post by aragonite »

Snow_Falls wrote: post #21
PoignardAzur wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Asterisk magazine has much more vivid, down-to-earth writing than "bay area rationalist magazine funded by effective altruism" would evoke. One of the articles in that same issue was the one that pushed me to finally become vegetarian.

I'm not sure I can trust a magazine that has a grammatical error in title of an article on the front page.* Now this doesn't say anything about the quality of the article itself (who doesn't make silly mistakes) but it does speak to a lack of editorial oversight. These sorts of basic mistakes do not inspire confidence. *bottom article on the front page: "Rarely is the Question Asked: Is Our Children Learning?" should…

It's a reference to this :)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushism#Education

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ej7ZEnjSeA

Re: America doesn't know tofu

#28

Post by Kon-Peki »

PoignardAzur wrote: post #5

If anyone else's wondering whether the author followed up on importing tofu in the US, here's what his webpage says: > It’s nice to meet you. I’m working on promoting Chinese tofus in the States. If you’re not familiar, China has over 20 types of tofus. They taste nothing like conventional white blocks. Some are bready. Others taste like aged cheese. Some bake up like pastry crust. Others melt. > I’m writing a book t…

> I’m also building a team to import and sell these ingredients to western supermarkets

Why? American farmers are great at growing soybeans. They even grow varieties that are exported to Asia specifically for making tofu.

There's an old story about when Honda first set up factories in Ohio, they still shipped the engines from Japan. After a while they got tired of returning the containers back empty, and went in search of something they could fill them with. In the end, they hired local farmers to grow specific soybeans that were desired in Japan - every engine crate from then on returned to Japan with those beans inside.

Re: America doesn't know tofu

#29

Post by ben_w »

Sirizarry wrote: post #15
ben_w wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm aware of Violife; the trouble is, while it melts, it has zero protein — from the ingredients it's basically solidified flavoured coconut oil: https://www.tesco.com/groceries/en-GB/products/302277589 To me, a true vegan cheese alternative has to tick all the boxes that cheese ticks at the same time, not a separate product for each box you want to tick.

Im sorry but you seriously worry about the protein content of your cheese? There are plenty other protein rich foods

Sure, for example, and as the link itself is about, tofu.

So what I do in practice when I want a vegan sandwich is a thin-ish slice of smoked tofu[0] instead of vegan cheese, before adding lettuce or cucumber or whatever.

When I want a vegan pizza, however, this particular tofu isn't very melty. It tastes great even cold, like cheese, but no melt.

Most days I'm only eating vegetarian, not vegan, but if I can get a good melty tofu that fits in a similar gap for both diet and flavour even as a simple topping (let alone as a more complex part of the recipe as in, say, quiche) then that makes it easier to eat vegan on more days.

[0] https://shop.rewe.de/p/rewe-bio-vegan-raeucher-tofu-2x175g/8...

Re: America doesn't know tofu

#30

Post by lupusreal »

Snow_Falls wrote: post #20
m0llusk wrote: post #14

There are some great Tofu suppliers in America, but also a labor saving device that allows people to easily experiment with variations themselves: https://www.soymilkmaker.com/ One of the problems is that, like so many things in America, tofu has taken on some silly political baggage. Among a significant share of the population, both conservative and health oriented, there is a common belief that soy is full of extro…

Don't forget the anti-asian racism implicit to the belief that soy, a food eaten widely in asia, makes you weak and feminine (whatever that means). The backlash to soy is inextricably tied to old stereotypes of asians as weak and docile.

Soy has long been grown in America but it isn't a traditional part of western diets and was generally considered animal feed (more so in the past than now). This isn't because Asians did eat it, but because westerners didn't in the first place.
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