Happy Boy
Chopped up tempeh
In case you have never cooked with tempeh, here is a quick primer. Tempeh is a high protein food. It is originally from Indonesia. It is a fermented soy item that comes in a brick. Uncooked it looks a little bit like pressed brains, because when fermented it forms curds that are then pressed together. It has more calories than tofu but is much more edible and easier on the gut.
This is Todd’s favorite recipe of all time. He always asks for it. It is the first thing I ever cooked for him, and I lost the recipe for several years before I yielded to his requests to figure out my own version.
Here goes:
Tempeh Peanut Curry Stir Fry
Stir frying veggies
The Veggies:
Almost any mix will do. You need about 8 cups of raw veggies to feed about 4 people. I use:
Red Onion
Garlic
Mushrooms
Carrots
Green Beans
Zucchini
But feel free to try your own favorites.
The Tempeh:
Buy it at either Whole Foods, Sunflower Market, or in the natural food area of some Smiths. I use one or two bricks chopped into 1 by ½ inch rectangles. You can buy extra and freeze it.
The Sauce:
This is the important part and is pretty easy to go wrong, so be careful. The biggest mistake I have made is to add too much sweetener. This is my modification of a recipe by ethnicvegetarian.com.
Sauce
Sauce:
1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
4 Tbs. agave nectar
4 Tbs. miso
1 Tbs. sesame oil
2 Tbs. lemon juice
1.5 Tbs. chili powder
1 Tbs Oregano
2 Tbs curry powder (or for a more delicious dinner, substitue Cali’s Natural Foods Curry Paste. If your curry paste isn’t potent enough, add more)
1/2 cup water, more if needed
Instructions:
I stir fry the veggies like you normally would and cook up some rice as I make the sauce. For the sauce, I combine all the ingredients and then heat it in the microwave, not to get it hot, just to melt the peanut butter to make it easier to stir. Stir and taste to see if it needs more spice, it should be very spicy. When the veggies are almost cooked add the sauce, mix together and serve over rice garnished with peanuts.
Final product
