Rice paper rolls and grilled tofu

Last week, my 5 Things I would Like to Make list brought us vegan chocolate mousse.

This week, I'm moving backwards, from dessert to savoury, from chocolate to rice paper rolls.

Before I do so, though, I hope you'll forgive me for pausing a minute to discuss tofu. The tofu that went in these rice paper rolls, to be precise.

This tofu:

It raised some serious questions. Why have I never grilled tofu before? Why do I not own a Scanpan stovetop grill? Why did grilling work so much better than stir frying, when I've always thought of tofu as a stir frying food?

You may be able to guess that I liked this tofu a lot.

The thing is, I didn't do anything particularly special to it. I marinated it in what was on hand in my parent's kitchen, which equated to sweet chilli sauce and a teriyaki marinade sauce that mostly consisted of soy sauce. Clearly, nothing fancy.

I am thus concluding that it was the grilling that was the key component, and only wish I'd caught on to this method of preparation sooner. I'm generally years behind other people with these sorts of discoveries, and I suspect this is no exception!

The Best Tofu I've Made To Date

300g pack of extra firm tofu, sliced

Pressed between tea towels and under heavy books for 30 minutes

Marinated in sweet chilli sauce (~3 tbsp) and teriyaki / soy sauce (~3 tbsp) for 4 hours

Grilled for ~10 minutes, turning regularly, until browned

To be eaten plain, added to stir fry, or used in rice paper rolls

Now that I've introduced the main ingredient, let me move on...

Rice paper rolls

As I mentioned in my original post, I made these once some years back. At that time, I found them to be quite fiddly, possibly as a result of my younger age, and possibly because I made 20 or so at once.

This time around, I made 6. Perhaps because of that, perhaps because of age, or perhaps just because, I found the process to be fairly easy. The only slightly fiddly aspect (which isn't really fiddly at all) is chopping the vegetables, and that's no different to chopping vegetables for any other dish.

Ingredients - to make 6

6 rice paper wrappers

2 carrots, finely sliced

1 small capsicum, finely sliced

1/2 - 1 cup lettuce, shredded

1/2 - 1 cup bean sprouts

A few mushrooms, sliced

Any other vegetables you like

Grilled tofu, as above

Mint and coriander

Soy sauce and/or sweet chilli sauce, extra

Instructions

Fill a shallow dish or curved dinner plate with warm water, and lay out a tea towel.

Place 1 sheet of rice paper in the warm water and allow to soften - approximately 30 seconds. Place on the tea towel and put the next sheet of paper in the water, to soften in advance.

In the middle of the softened rice paper sheet, place a strip of tofu and an assortment of vegetables. Add mint and coriander, and any other flavourings as desired.

Fold in the bottom end, the left side, the top end, and then the right side. Hold together and turn the roll over, so the rolled in sides are underneath. 

Repeat for the remaining rolls, and serve with extra dipping sauce as desired.

A lot of rice paper rolls include vermicelli noodles too, but I didn't feel the need to add them here.

If I do say so myself, they were delicious! I will definitely be making these again, and can't believe I put it off for so long.

It's really rather fun to think I can now do these at home, and experiment with fillings and flavours as I like. There are certainly advantages in self-preparing things, even though I'm all for easy / purchased lunches at times.

Do you make rice paper rolls? Or grill tofu? Do you have any favourite flavourings for either?

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