Soy is a high protein food that can replace animal products. Chinese chefs have invented recipes that turn soybeans into butter, sour cream, cheese, and even meat. You can make a lot of healthy dishes from soybeans, but first you need to learn how to make soy milk and tofu on your own at home - the basis of many Chinese soy dishes.
Soy milk
Ingredients:
- soybeans - 800 g;
- water for soaking - 8 glasses;
- water for preparing milk - 8 glasses.
This recipe is for 1 liter of prepared soy milk. If you need less or more, decrease or increase the ingredients in the appropriate proportions.
Rinse soybeans and soak in water for 10-12 hours (this rule is mandatory for all recipes). Then drain the water, rinse the beans, put them in a saucepan and cover with fresh water. Put the saucepan on the fire, bring to a boil and immediately remove from the stove. Strain the water through a strainer into a clean dish. Grind the boiled soybeans in a blender, or pass through a meat grinder using the finest grate (it is better to repeat this procedure 2-3 times). If you are using a blender, gradually add the previously strained water to the chopped soybeans until you have added all of it. If you skipped the soybeans through a meat grinder, then add water to the resulting puree also gradually with constant stirring. Next, squeeze the mass through cheesecloth. To do this, make a two-layer napkin out of gauze, place it in a saucepan or bowl, pour the soybean puree into it, tie the corners of the napkin and hang it on a hook over the pan (ready-made soy milk will drain into it).
You can store soy milk in the refrigerator just like ordinary cow's milk, but before that, be sure to boil it and cool it at room temperature.
Tofu cheese
- soy milk - 1 l;
- lemon - 1 pc.
Juice one lemon, pour it into a pot of soy milk and close the lid. Wait 15-20 minutes for the milk to curd (curd). In the meantime, take a colander and line it with double-folded gauze. Then use a slotted spoon to remove the soy flakes from the pan and place them in a colander. Cover the top with the ends of the gauze, put the load and leave for an hour and a half. After the allotted time, remove the load, carefully so as not to break it, remove the cheese along with gauze from the colander and transfer to a bowl filled with fresh cold (preferably ice-cold) water. The tofu will be ready in an hour. You can store it in a container of cold water in the refrigerator for a week.
Walnut and soybean paste
- tofu cheese - 300 g;
- shelled walnuts - 200 g;
- sour cream - 100 g;
- granulated sugar - 50 g;
- vanillin, cinnamon to taste.
Making pasta is very simple. Grind the nuts in a mortar. In a blender, combine tofu cheese, chopped nuts, sour cream, granulated sugar and spices. Make sandwiches with pasta and serve with tea. If not used right away, transfer to a glass jar and store in the refrigerator for no more than 3 days.
Sprouted soybean salad
Ingredients:
- soybeans - 200 g;
- onion - 1 pc.;
- vegetable oil - 1-2 tablespoons;
- tofu cheese - 50-100 g;
- garlic - 1 clove;
- sesame seeds - 1 tsp;
- soy sauce - 1 tablespoon
Sprout soybeans. To do this, rinse them and soak them for 6-8 hours. Then place in a container with a hole in the bottom (you can use a new flower pot or colander) and cover with a clean cloth to keep out direct light. Water the beans with lukewarm water: 3 times in summer and 2 times in winter during the day. If the container is placed in a warm place (closer to the radiator, stove, stove), they will germinate faster. At room temperature, soybeans germinate in about 2 weeks in the cold season, in 4-5 days in the warm season.
Ready-to-eat sprouts are considered to be 5 cm long. For salad, take only sprouts, the beans themselves are no longer suitable for food.
Cut the onion into rings, fry in vegetable oil until golden brown and let cool. Then add soy sprouts, garlic skipped through a garlic, sesame seeds to the onion and stir. Pour soy sauce over everything, serve as a healthy cold snack.
If you want to make soy sauce yourself, keep in mind that making it at home is quite difficult, because you will need the Koji fungus (sourdough), which you can hardly find in Russian stores. And the very process of fermentation, fermentation, as well as the further production of sauce in Chinese traditions, takes a very long time. There is a variant of making soy sauce "in Russian". Take 100 g soybeans, 2 tablespoons. rice broth, 1 tbsp. flour and 2 tbsp. butter. Soak soybeans, boil until tender and grind in a blender. Add broth, butter, flour and a pinch of salt. Stir, put on medium heat and bring to a boil with constant stirring. The Russian analogue of soy sauce is ready, you can pour it over the salad.
