Tofu Balls and Mint Yogurt Sauce
Soy is one ingredient that I want to eat a lot more of. The only problem is, I don’t really know how to incorporate it into my diet. Plus, up until recently, soy, to me, basically equalled tofu, and I didn’t care much for tofu.
I’m learning, however, that soy really does not equal tofu. There is a lot more to it. You can consume soy in the form of beans, be them dried, sprouted, fresh (also known as edamame), or roasted. There’s also soy “milk”, soy flour, soy paste, tempeh, yuba and miso, to name a few. Now that’s a lot of options to choose from!
I’ve already switched from cow to soy milk quite a while ago. I never cared for cow’s milk anyway, so it was rather easy to change. It was just a matter of getting used to the taste. I started with vanilla; then I switched to unflavoured and more recently to unsweetened. Good. Now what else? How do I cook with soy? I need to find inspiration, and lots of it.
My mom recently gave me this SUPERB recipe book entirely dedicated to cooking with soy. The pictures in it are really beautiful and truly inspire me to try some (a lot) of the recipes. This is the first one I tried. Since I was extremely happy with how it turned out, you can expect to see a quite a few more in the upcoming weeks / months.
Ingredients (Adapted from Healthy Soy, Cooking with soybeans)
(serves 4)
Tofu balls
- 300g extra firm tofu
- ¼ cup flat leaf parsley, finely chopped
- 1 celery rib, finely chopped
- 1 garlic clove, crushed
- 4 green onions, finely chopped
- 1 cup soy and flax breadcrumbs (I used whole wheat)
- 2 tbsp Japanese soy sauce
- 1/3 cup tahini
- 1/3 cup raisins
- ½ tsp cumin
- ¼ tsp ground coriander
- ½ tsp chilli paste (sambal oelek)
- ¼ cup cornmeal
- 2 tbsp soy oil
Mint Yogurt Sauce
- 180g silk tofu, drained
- ¾ cup 0% plain greek yogurt
- 3 tbsp finely chopped fresh mint leaves
- 2 tbsp lemon juice
- 1 garlic clove, minced
- Salt and pepper to taste
Almond rice
- 1 cup brown basmati rice
- 2½ cups water
- ½ tsp salt
- 50g toasted almonds, chopped
INSTRUCTIONS
Rice
- In a fine sieve, rinse rice thoroughly under cold running water.
- Transfer to saucepan with salt and water. Bring to a boil then lower heat, cover and simmer for 25-30 minutes, until water is absorbed.
- Add almonds and stir to combine.
Tofu Balls
- In a food processor, grind the tofu until its texture resembles that of breadcrumbs. Add parsley, garlic, green onions and celery until mixture and give this mixture a quick pulse until well combined.
- Transfer to mixing bowl, add breadcrumbs, tahini, raisins, soy sauce, cumin, coriander and chilli paste. Mix thoroughly and shape into little bite size balls. Roll each ball in cornmeal.
- Heat oil in skillet over medium-high heat and cook the balls until nice and golden on all sides, about 8-10 minutes in total.
Yogurt Mint Sauce
- Puree tofu in a food processor, then add the rest of the ingredients and mix until well combined.
9 Comments on “Tofu Balls and Mint Yogurt Sauce”
These look fabulous. Mine would never turn out so well. I’ve got to check out that cookbook.
Oh, you really should. It’s absolutely fabulous, I tell you. Expect to see quite a few of the recipes found in the book on here too! 🙂
These look super tasty, I tend to like anything tofu and/or tahini related and with all these delicious ingredients, this recipe sounds so very good!!
Thanks Trudy! 😉 If you like tofu / tahini related food, you’ll absolutely love these! If you do try the recipe, let me know how you liked them! 🙂
wow these look so great! I dont think i would even get any complaints that they were tofu!
They look so fresh and tasty..I bet that they are also very healthy, I will sure try them as soon as I find a good tofu..it seems to me that I have a problem in finding a good one for cooking.
Tofu balls. What an awesome (and cute) ideas!!! I will try your recipe this week. I will pair it with an Arugula salad http://cuceesprouts.com/2011/05/blueberry-surprise-salad/, a recipe that I posted on my blog recently. The two will go really well together
Hi Sonia,
I’ve made your tofu balls, with some small variations based on the ingredients I had. I also baked them, instead of frying. They are so yummy ! Thanks for this lovely recipe 🙂
I posted this recipe and linked back to you http://cookingrookie.blogspot.com/2011/05/tofu-balls-with-cabbage.html
I hope it’s ok 🙂
It’s more than OK! It’s appreciated! I love great feedback, and I love that recipes travel and evolve! Your version looks even healthier than mine… looks like I’ve got some catching up to do! 😉
It’s too bad you had to leave the raisins out though. I thought they brought A LOT to the dish (read, they were my favorite part!)
Thanks again for your awesome feedback! 🙂