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w/ Sticky Jasmine Rice and Lightly Pickled Cucumber
Serves 3
Cooking time ~30 minutes
This is a bit of a mismatch of cuisines - Chinese Black Pepper Tofu, Cypriot Halloumi and Thai Rice but trust me it works! Cooking Black Pepper into this sauce gives it quite a bit of heat. Frying pieces of Tofu and Halloumi in Cornflour means they'll retain their crunch when you toss them in the sauce. This dish is packed full of saltiness and flavour so some lightly pickled Cucumber brings much needed freshness.
Ingredients:
250g Asparagus Spears
300g Tofu
200g Halloumi
1x heaped tbsp Black Pepper
2x Garlic Cloves
1x Chunk of Fresh Ginger
2tbsp Cornflour
1x Cucumber
2tbsp Caster Sugar
1tbsp Salt
1tbsp Rice Wine Vinegar
1/3 Cup Soy Sauce
300g Jasmine Rice
Method:
Start by draining and drying your Tofu and Halloumi. Remove both from their packaging and gently squeeze as much liquid out as you can. Then, leave the Halloumi to one side. Wrap the Tofu gently in a few sheets of kitchen roll and place something about as heavy as a small saucepan on top. Leave to dry while you get on with the rest of the prep.
Chop the Cucumber up into small bite-size chunks. Add to a bowl with 1tbsp Salt, 1tbsp Sugar and 1tbsp Rice Wine Vinegar. Sprinkle some Chilli Flakes, mix well and cover with cling film. Usually you would want this to pickle for longer, but as you want maximum crisp and freshness from this Cucumber, 10 minutes or so will be fine.
Finely chop the Garlic and Fresh Ginger. You should have a ratio of about 1Garlic:2Ginger. Set this aside. Crack some Black Pepper into a small bowl / ramekin. This will take a while as you want a heaped tablespoon's worth. You can use crushed whole Peppercorns (the flavour will be more intense) but Black Pepper from a Peppermill works just fine.
Wash, trim and slice the Asparagus. Cut the Spears into about 3. Set aside.
Check how long your Rice needs to cook. The dish should take around 15/20 minutes from now, so I would get it on to cook.
Now back to the Tofu & Halloumi. Carefully slice these up. I like to finely cube the Halloumi and then slice the Tofu into longer thinner strips. Having a mixture of sizes is a bit nicer, and if you keep the Tofu pretty thin it will crisp up more easily.
Toss both (but seperately) in some Cornflour, so that it's all lightly coated, and get two pans on a medium/high heat with some Vegetable Oil.
Fry the Tofu and Halloumi until nice and golden brown. It will probably take about 3 or 4 minutes on each side. You should get really crispy Tofu and a nice colouring on the Halloumi. Set these aside to drain and crisp up even further. Drain any excess Oil from one of the pans and add a splash of Olive Oil.
Reduce the heat to about medium and add the Black Pepper. Cook for a minute or so until you can start to smell it perfuming then add the Asparagus, stir frying for 2 minutes. Add the Ginger and Garlic and toss everything together. Cook for another minute.
Add the Tofu and Halloumi to the pan, stir around so they both get nicely coated. Turn the heat up slightly and add the Soy Sauce and 1tbsp Sugar. Toss this together well and let the Soy cook off slightly and reduce. This should take around 3 minutes.
Plate up and serve! I like to add the Cucumber on top and you can throw in some Fresh Chilli and Sesame Seeds if you like.
Enjoy. If you fancy sharing your effort, then please tag @wellgoodgrub on Instagram.
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