Warming David's House

Our good friend, David, recently bought a house in Hillcrest. He's spent the last several months feeling like he actually lives at Home Depot and completely renovated it from top to bottom. Among other things he put in an addition, replaced the flooring (and roof!), remodeled, painted, scrubbed and cut and has completed his vision. You'll quickly notice David's vision happens to be clean, modern, and mostly white.

See recipe below!

Although David scoffed when I made reference to a real life Pinterest house he did have some creative DIY uses that are worth mentioning!

The dining room table was a DIY project. David used the butcher block from Ikea to create the table top. Additionally he used the extra material from his curtains to create the placemats at the table as well.

The meal served that night was wonderful and the tofu in particular was fabulous. David's kindly provided the recipe at the bottom of this post.

Agedashi Tofu

Ingredients: 
- Soft tofu
- Potato starch
- Bonito flakes
- Green onions
- Soy sauce
- Dashi stock (see notes below)
- Mirin (sweet rice wine)
 - Rice bran oil

Directions:
For dashi sauce: 
- In a small saucepan, combine 2 part dashi stock, 1 part mirin, and 1 part soy sauce. Bring to boil, and set aside.

For tofu:
- Drain tofu and cut tofu into bite sized pieces that are identical in size. Place pieces onto several dry paper towels. Soft tofu is delicate, so be careful not to tear the tofu.
- Place several dry paper towels on top of the tofu, and place a heavy cutting board on top to get rid of excess moisture in tofu. Leave for 20 minutes, or until the paper towels are saturated in water.
- Lightly coat tofu pieces on all sides in potato starch, and fry in rice bran oil at around 400°C. For best results, coat the tofu in the potato starch immediately prior to frying. Fry until light brown and crispy on the outside. Drain fried tofu on paper plate to soak up excess oil.

To plate:
-Place three of four peices of tofu in a stack at the center of the bowl. Spoon heated dashi sauce over tofu. Garnish with minced green onion and bonito flakes. Serve immediately.

Notes:
-Some ingredients may be difficult to find in western supermarkets. Asian supermarkets will most likely be your best bet.
- Cornstarch may be substituted for potato starch, but the resulting texture will be slightly heavier. - There are different kinds of dashi stock. I prefer one that is branded as 'Hon-Dashi' which comes in a powder that you mix with water to create the stock.
- For a vegetarian version, omit the bonito flakes, and use a kombu (dried kelp) version of the dashi stock.