Tofu and BaiCai Stir Fry

An unexpected afternoon left to my own devices on a miserable gray day, when my attempts to go for a run have failed and the thought of doing the shopping I'd been planning seems repugnant?

Why not get up to some nonsense in the kitchen? And, while I'm at it, why not cook dinner without curry in it for once?

Napa cabbage is called baicai (白菜) in Chinese, and I like it much more than regular cabbage. I once came across a six foot tall baicai carved out of marble, and I almost bought it and had it shipped home to my parents for the fun of imagining them looking at it and saying to themselves, "What the hell is our daughter getting up to in China?"

This dish might be called "朝豆腐和白菜" in Chinese (Chao Doufu he baicai). Or possibly "烹" (peng) instead of "朝" (chao). It might also be referred to as Vegetarian Singapore Noodles.

Ingredients
1/2 package (4 oz) tofu
1/2 T Thai Sweet Chili Sauce
2 T mushroom stir fry sauce
1 T garlic oil or similar
2 T rice vinegar
2 T dark soy sauce
1 lb napa cabbage (bai cai)
garlic, ginger, chili powder, salt, pepper
4 oz. rice vermicelli

Methodology

1. Mix the chili sauce, mushroom sauce, garlic oil, vinegar, and soy sauce in a bowl. Cut tofu into pieces and mix it in. Cover and leave in fridge for a while. Take a nap, eat some toast, agonize over your novel. Eventually, wander back and hack the cabbage into bits.

2. Put some oil in the wok and heat it, along with some garlic, powdered ginger (or fresh ginger), and chili powder. Take the tofu out using a slotted spoon and put it in the wok (you probably want to keep the heat on medium). Reserve the marinade.

3. When tofu is sufficiently cooked, put it in a bowl and add more oil to the wok, then dump in the cabbage. Be careful, because if you washed the cabbage (and I hope you did) water will cling to the leaves, and water + hot oil = bad stuff. Cook the cabbage until it's wilted, adding salt and pepper, chili powder, etc. to taste.

4. Reintegrate the tofu and cook it along with the cabbage and the extra marinade. Bring some water to a boil and cook the noodles for three or four minutes (until tender), then drain.

5. Remove about 2 servings of tofu-and-baicai, then add the noodles to the remainder. You could just cook a whole bunch of noodles and mix it all, but I wanted to be able to have rice with the leftovers if I took a fancy for it. When everything reaches the same temperature, take it off and eat it.

Makes about three or four servings, about 300-350 calories per serving, depending on size and noodle choice.

Notes

*I was in a hurry and should have put in more ginger. Still, quite good. Pulling the noodles apart was a problem; I got bits of dry rice noodle everywhere. If you finish cooking them much before the stir fry is done, you can put them in cold water to keep them from turning into rice gloop.

*The amount of marinade that I wound up with was enough for probably twice as much tofu (which is how much I figured I'd be cooking when I started making it, appropriately enough). I feel like you shouldn't finish up swimming in marinade, so probably reduce the amounts by a half, except for the mushroom sauce.

*The recipe is very adaptable, and if you have pickled ginger/kimchi/roasted garlic lying around you might want to toss it in to see what happens. Experimentation is of course the great thing about cooking, and the great thing about living on your own is that your mother is never going to walk in and ask you in that certain tone why the kitchen is covered with hot sauce.

At least I am glad no one is going to ask me that. I'm going to go scrub some things down.