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FOOD FOR THOUGHT By
Wanda A. Adams
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| • | Spicy sessions |
Tofu salad — chunks of tofu, watercress, tomato, bean sprouts and so on — is an Island favorite, a healthy light lunch or side dish and common at potlucks, too.
But the secret is in the dressing. And one of the most frequent requests I receive is for the dressing used by Safeway delis. Safeway doesn't share that one, so I decided to get busy and see if I could duplicate the flavor. I didn't expect difficulty: Asian salad dressings are all about the same, right? Shoyu, sugar, oil, maybe mirin, maybe sake, maybe miso, maybe dashi, some garlic. ... Hmmm, come to think of it, that's an awful lot of variables.
One Saturday, I covered the kitchen counter with little bowls and started with a basic shoyu-sugar formula borrowed from various community cookbook recipes.
Tasted alone, Safeway's dressing packs quite a salty-sweet punch. Especially when I began to taste it side by side with my rather pathetic and pallid attempts. The process was hilarious. I'd get close, change one thing and suddenly be ice-cold again.
Was it ginger juice — no, very wrong. It wasn't a Japanese brand of vinegar; Aloha Shoyu tasted much more right. I thought I detected some fruit and tried both lemon and orange juice in separate batches; nope. There seemed to be some smokiness, so I tired a drop of Liquid Smoke; very bad idea. Dashi (Japanese-style fish or seaweed stock) seemed possible, so I tried that and it didn't do much. Heck, maybe the saltiness came from ... well, salt; wrong again, shoyu-breath.
Three things I think I got right: It contains miso. There's mirin, or possibly mirin and sugar. And if you first heat the oil and infuse it with garlic, that seems to give you the garlic flavor (garlic powder doesn't dissolve well and remains visible).
My husband and I sipped and smacked and savored, and I hit the books to see if there was something I hadn't thought of.
Finally, 12 tries into it, I was beginning to think I was getting there. I tinkered a bit more, and this is the result. Let me know what you think.
SAFEWAY-STYLE ASIAN DRESSING
Heat sesame oil in small saucepan, and add garlic. Heat just until garlic sizzles; strain and discard garlic.
Combine sesame oil with shoyu, sugars, mirin, miso and rice vinegar. Whisk together.
Makes 5-6 servings.
Send recipes and queries to Wanda A. Adams, Food Editor, Honolulu Advertiser, P.O. Box 3110, Honolulu, HI 96802. Fax: 525-8055. E-mail: wadams@honoluluadvertiser.com.
For more information about our 150th anniversary cookbook, call 535-8189 (message phone; your call will be returned). You can order the cookbook online.
