Tofu may not have the best reputation as an ingredient for fine dining, but this is mainly due to compromises forced on commercial Tofu production to ensure long shelf life.

Fresh Tofu, on the other hand, is a useful ingredient which will happily carry a range of flavours and seasonings to deliver a creative and delicious plant-based dish.

To create fresh tofu you have to curdle soy milk using Glucono Delta Lactone, also known as GDL, and press the curds. You must use fresh soy milk for this as it will not work with off-the-shelf soy milk.

Making Fresh Soy Milk
  • 400g Dried Soy Beans

Wash and rinse the beans. Cover with cold water to 5cm above the beans, and leave to soak for 18 hours. Keep the water topped up while soaking so that it remains 5cm above the beans.

Drain off the water leaving just the beans.

Warm 2 litres of water. Put the beans into the Thermomix with the warmed water and blend until smooth. Add another 2 litres of water and bring to the boil. Simmer for 1 minute.

Hang through a muslin cloth until all the liquid has drained.

Put the liquid back into a pan, bring to the boil and simmer for 5 minutes, then strain again.

Freshly Pressed Tofu
  • 3 litres Fresh Soy Milk
  • 3.5g Glucono Delta-Lactone (GDL)
  • 50ml Water

Bring the soy milk to boil in a large pan.

Mix the GDL and water, and stir into the boiled milk. Remove from the heat, cover with a lid and leave for 10-15 minutes.

The milk will split. Carefully lift out the curds and put into a mould lined with muslin cloth.

Press for 3 hours, until excess liquid has been squeezed out. Unwrap from the cloth and store in the fridge.