Recipe: Lao Ban 老伴 style soy bean curd. 豆花

One fascinating thing about Singapore which I find endearing in an odd way is food fad.  Something new, or in the case of soy bean curd, something updated, would appear on the market, tastes great, and for a period of time, would draw crowds of people obsessed with getting a taste - I included.  Many long queues and a few 'copycats' or 'alternatives' later, the food may continue to draw a crowd, e.g. Koi bubble tea, or become part of the scene, e.g. apple strudel.  But I may be outdated in my examples as it's been a year since we've been away...

In the months before we left Singapore, it was soy bean curd which had the honor of being sought after for a while.  I recall us buying tubs of the goodie from Old Airport Road Food Center and bringing to gatherings, and once, even to give away as breakfast to the early few who were working with me that particular morning.

Since we have been making our own soy bean milk (a colleague gave me a very good Joyoung soy milk maker when she repatriated), it wasn't too big a leap for me to want to make soy bean curd.  

The thing about making soy bean curd, which is actually soy milk jello, is finding the right coagulant.  I did a bit of research online and read that some people use pectin, which is a fruit base coagulant used to make jam.  That sounds sour and did make the jello taste sour, which is incorrect.  

So I turned to plain unflavored gelatin and bought a box from the Knox brand.  That worked but the texture was not right.  I had forgotten that there are many types of gelatin and my experience with jello is that there are two commonly encountered types - the thicker, stickier stuff, and the firmer sometimes cruchier variety.  

More research later, I read that what is needed to achieve a creamy soft consistency is "Instant Jelly Powder" from the Red Man brand.  It is that specific, but that's not available here.  It's not available as well on amazon.com.  So I had my younger sisters ship me some, and these arrived a week or so ago.

Using the Red Man stuff worked.  The output was delicious.  Taking a closer look at the ingredients in the instant jelly powder, I see sugar, and carrageenan. I needed Wikipedia to tell me what that is - and that reminds me of something I read, that ignorance in today's online world is a choice (that's pretty stressful and I'm supposed to be de-stressing now before resuming work).   Anyway, carrageenan is apparently extracted from red sea weed, and is sometimes a vegetarian and vegan alternative to gelatin.  Hooray for my vegesaurus friends.

So here's the recipe, which is not my invention but adapted from a bunch of others' recipes (mainly the Lao Ban style version), and tried and tested and loved.  Hope it works for you.

Ingredients

700 ml of soy milk (if your soy milk is unsweetened, add sugar to taste or try adding about 35g of sugar)

30g of Coffeemate, original flavor (Surprise!! I love Coffeemate and hadn't realize what a taste changer it was to soy bean curd)

14g of instant jelly powder (if you're not using Red Man, you might need to experiment to get the proportion right)

1. Heat soy milk but do not allow it to boil.  Add sugar if soy milk is unsweetened to begin with.

2. Add in Coffeemate and keep stirring.  Best to use a whisk of some sort to ensure that the powder and soy milk is well mixed.

3. You really need a good stirrer in this next step - add in jelly powder, keep it on the heat and keep stirring to mix well.

4. Remove from heat and quickly pour into little portion-size containers.

5. Let cool to room temperature and store in fridge.

6. Your soy bean curd should be ready to enjoy when it's cold.