Jen Vanya came up with this. Her message is as good as her her sauce...
Go into the woods with a spear and stalk the tofu. Only fresh tofu will work in this recipe. Once you have stabbed the tofu with your spear sufficiently enough to stop it from mauling you to death, skin and gut the tofu in the field with a dull butter knife. Drive home with the tofu trophy lashed to the front of your car (this mental image is causing me to laugh out loud in the library.) Mount the tofu's "head" on the wall, and take the "body" to the kitchen for further dissection. Once you have a clean square of tofu free of bones, sinew, fur, fangs, claws, eyeballs, and generally gross inedible parts, (this square chunk will look amazingly similar to what you will find in the store in a little 8 oz. +/- sealed container of FIRM tofu), you may proceed with the following recipe.
Remember, tofus were put on this earth to be maimed and murdered in the name of my spaghetti sauce recipe.
| A. | The night before | May be up one week before. | |
| tofu, firm | 1 package | Or one square chunk of freshly killed tofu | |
Drain the tofu by beating it violently with a mallet (or if using a package kind, slit the top open and simply pour off the excess liquid.) Freeze tofu overnight, or up to the point when no one knows what the hell it was and throws it out. |
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| B. | The morning of cooking | ||
Remove the tofu from the freezer and thaw it in the refrigerator. |
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| C. | onion | 1 large | chopped |
| garlic | 3 cloves | minced | |
| red bell pepper | 1 | chopped | |
| oil | 1 tablespoon | ||
In a large pot heat the oil on medium high until it shimmers. Add the garlic and stir constantly for 30 seconds. Add the onion and bell pepper, and stir to prevent the garlic from burning. Cook until the onion and pepper are soft. |
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| D. | tomato sauce | 2 - 15 oz cans | |
| tomato paste | 1 can | ||
| whole canned tomatoes | 30 oz can | Chopped into pieces. Look for a brand with calcium added as it helps the tomatoes hold their texture when cooked. | |
| oregano, dried | 1 tablespoon | ||
| basil, dried | 2 teaspoons | ||
| thyme, dried | 2 teaspoons | ||
| red wine | 1/4 cup | ||
| salt | to taste | ||
| black pepper, ground | 1/2 teaspoon | ||
| Tabasco sauce | 1/2 teaspoon | ||
Add all to the pot and bring to a boil. Then reduce to a simmer and cook, uncovered, for 30 minutes. Stir often so the sauce doesn't burn! |
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| E. | brown mushrooms | 1/2 pound | sliced |
Add the mushrooms to the pot. Take the thawed tofu and squeeze all the mosture out of it with your hands. Crumble the dry tofu into the sauce - it should have the texture of fried ground meat. Cook for 20 minutes longer, being sure to keep the sauce from burning on the bottom. Serve over any pasta, or store in the refrigerator for up to two days. |
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