mapo tofu

TOC
• ingredients
• instructions

# ingredients

• Shiitake mushrooms
• Garlic
• Ginger
• Sichuan peppercorns
• Pixian doubanjiang
• Fresh chilli for heat
• Preserved black beans
• Meaty-flavour stock (MSG)
• Cornstarch to thicken
• Soft tofu

# instructions

# preparation

Aromatics:

1. Make sure to rehydrate your mushrooms if they are dried; soak in hot water for 30 min to 1 hour. Keep the soaking liquid to make the stock later on.
2. Dice up garlic, ginger and mushrooms.
3. Toast the sichuan peppercorns until they start to leave little oil spots in an otherwise dry pan. Then crush with a mortar and pestle.

For the stock:

1. Use the water from soaking the mushrooms and add in a bit of MSG and flavour powder, stir until dissolved.

Tofu:

1. cut into little cubes

# start the sauce

1. Heat up some vegetable oil in a pan, enough to cover all of your aromatics. Get it to a medium-low heat, you don’t want to burn anything, just infuse the oil with flavour.
2. Add in the ground sichuan peppercorns first, let infuse for 30s-1min, until the fragrance becomes strong.
3. Add the ginger next, same deal
4. Add the garlic, same again
5. Add the black beans and chillies. Move the chillies around so they do not burn.
6. Add the mushrooms now, and turn up the heat a little. The aim is to crisp up and turn the mushrooms golden.
7. When the mushrooms are golden, add in the doubanjiang. It will spit a bit, make sure there is enough oil so it does not stick to the pan. A little bit of sticking is fine, it will come off with the stock later.
8. Stir the mixture around, until the oil becomes stained red by the bean paste.

# finish the sauce

1. Add the stock into the pan, about 160 ml.
2. Let the sauce bubble for a minute
3. Make a cornstarch slurry and add to thicken to a saucy consistency.
4. Add the tofu and mix in the sauce
5. Simmer for 3-5 mins
6. Add sesame oil and leftover ground sichuan peppercorns.

Done! Eat with rice :)