Homemade ‘Marinated Tofu-feta’
My recipe for marinated feta made of tofu
Pros: Easy to make, cheap, versatile, many different flavour options
Cons: Uses quite a lot of oil, will not keep for a long time
I’d previously had Tofetta from Blue Lotus, and enjoyed its springy salty flavour. However, I have barely seen it in Melbourne – and the places I am told stock it are too far for me to regularly visit. I decided it was about time I made my own.
Now, I’ve never liked the feta that came in shrink wrap plastic particularly – mainly because I disliked the water it swims in, just as I dislike the water that tofu comes in. I have always thought that it’s a beautiful cheese, though, because of its crisp white colour and ability to maintain a precise square shape or to be crumbled on food (or pizza!). When marinated, feta becomes a whole lot more interesting to me – flavoursome, salty and an incredible addition to salads of all descriptions, there’s not much to dislike. This was the type of feta I wanted to emulate.
It’s the easiest thing in the world, it turns out, and it’s not hugely expensive either. I bought myself a $2.80 block of hard tofu from Woolworths (it’s their own brand organic tofu) and a medium-sized bottle of high quality extra virgin olive oil (around $6) on a whim, and headed home. I’ll note here that you don’t need to use the best oil available, but spending more of your money on the oil rather than the other ingredients is a good move.
I selected hard tofu as it’s the closest in texture, and is a little crumbly so suits the feta-style (we crumbled up another block and turned it into scrambled tofu for dinner).
To me, the addition of feta to a salad is largely about the texture it adds, but also about the spiced flavour and the oiliness. It also retains its shape easily and doesn’t break up without a lot of force, so I felt comfortable leaving it in a marinade for as long as I wanted. The firm tofu has small air holes in it, which I hoped would assist in absorbing the marinade – but I wasn’t 100% convinced.
I chopped up the tofu to the sizes I wanted – not too big, as I wanted them to infuse with flavour pretty quickly, but not too small either. I didn’t worry about keeping the shapes perfect, as it’s nice for them to be a little rustic, but I did try to roughly measure it out. The block of tofu made enough to fill three small jars.
When putting the tofu cubes in the jars, don’t make it too full – you want enough space that you can shake the jar and have any spices and flavours you put in move through the oil, and you also want to ensure that the jar is filled up with the olive oil.
I’ve seen online recipes calling for vinegars and misos (tofu misozuke discussion is for another time), even one calling for truffle, but my first stop was to keep things simple and settle in with good oil and some clever flavour pairings.
In the first jar (a leftover jar from pickled artichokes): Fresh rosemary (about one large sprig broken into individual fronds) Garlic salt (one teaspoon) Garlic (one clove, finely chopped) Pepper (a thorough amount) Mixed dried herbs (pinch)
This was my attempt at a more traditional flavour.
In the second jar (this was a leftover jar from a Botanical Cuisine cheese!): Chargrilled capsicum (leftover from my nacho cheese recipe – it was already infused with mustard seeds) Smoked paprika (one teaspoon)
I wanted to see what no salt tasted like in the marinated final product, as the Tofetta I’d previously bought was great but too salty for my tastes.
In the third jar (this still has the label on, and is from Five Spice – a vegan green curry paste): Lemon juice (quarter of a lemon) Dried chives (one teaspoon) Crushed garlic paste (one teaspoon) Sage powder (half a teaspoon)
I love lemon juice with everything, so this was just an experiment with other things left in the pantry, including a jar of crushed garlic that we needed to get through.
I then filled them all to the brim with oil, thoroughly shook them up, and put them in the fridge for 24 hours. The first one was the most beautiful to look at, although the colours in the chargrilled pepper one were great. The third was strange – the cloudy lemon juice separating from the oil and settling at the bottom.
When I took out the rosemary one after the 24 hours and tried a bit, I was left underwhelmed. It wasn’t very strongly flavoured and I could barely taste the salt – a lot of the flavouring had also settled right at the bottom of the jar. So I added quite a bit more and then put it in the fridge. Another 24 hours later and something bizarre had happened – the olive oil had solidified!
Quite odd, although I hear that extra virgin olive oil has a tendency to go solid at refrigeration temperatures. Apparently mixing through with vegetable oil (maybe sunflower?) helps, however it also comes back to a liquid at room temperature so isn’t a huge issue. In my mind I was wondering whether this would actually help the oil to infuse the tofu a bit more.
I figured it was worth leaving it for a little longer. Online, some recommendations for marinades were up to 72 hours, so I figured it would be fine for another few days. This was far better. The resulting feta cheeses were much more infused than before, with the stand out actually being the previously subtle rosemary feta that seemed to have benefited from the extra salt.
The lack of salt in the smoked paprika feta was an issue, and it really did need it to make it less like tofu floating in oil! The third was excellent, slightly sour and with a great bite, and the crushed jarred garlic was brilliant as it was even more pungent than fresh. Although I was pretty happy with two of the three, and the colours I was seeing (the red paprika actually made the tofu quite pretty), I was almost certain that I could make it even better.
I did my reading up on tofu, which went against a lot of the recipes I’d seen on the web. It appears as though the oil should be used for keeping them stored in only, and for a beautiful display, but not for giving them the flavouring. The flavours should, largely, be instilled through a brine marinade. This makes a lot of sense given the high water content in most tofu.
The improved recipe
So I started over. I used a new tofu as it was cheaper, though it appears to be very similar.
The other tofu feta I’d made before were stir-fried for dinner (and then used the infused oil for other dishes, which was amazing by the way). Then I went back to the drawing board. I bought myself another packet of tofu, and this time got hefty with drying it out.
I wasn’t up for waiting overnight, but I drained the packet, chopped it up and then covered it in paper kitchen towel. I then used heavy recipe books to press the water out of them (and was subsequently surprised by how damp the paper towels were as a result). This took about an hour or two of pressing.
Then I made thick salty brine with the flavours I’d intended to put into them through the oil before. I used a lot of salt, garlic salt, pepper, lemon juice, nutmeg and mixed herbs, and then left them to marinade for about two hours. Again, this could be done over 24 hours and likely to better effect, but I was determined to have them in the oil and out of my hair by the end of the day.
I then added whole sage leaves, and some chopped, chopped rosemary (and a big sprig of it, as I was using a beautiful old jalapeno jar), one clove of garlic finely chopped, a teaspoonful of crushed garlic from the jar, half a lemon’s worth of juice, garlic salt and pepper.
I drained the tofu from the brine, added it to the jar and then topped it up with the oil. I then gave it a really good shake and put it into the fridge for 48 hours.
After that, I left it out for a little to reach room temperature. I had a bag of baby spinach, and some mixed marinated olives that I’d bought, and adding in some cucumber, red onion, corn, a little bit of chili and mashed avocado, the dish was ready to be eaten with tofu added to the top. We had this as a side to my homemade cheesy ravioli (which I’m writing up to share with you), and it was nice to have something fresh – we aren’t really huge salad fans generally but this was great.
It’s actually better in the brine first as not only is it intensely salty throughout but it also doesn’t absorb as much oil inside, meaning it’s not as overwhelming. If you’re not a huge salt fan, then you’ll want to lower the amount of salt put into the brine. This was pretty darn salty, just how we like it.
It would be good to try them with sesame oils, or with infused olive oil. Chili oil mixed in with the olive oil would also be fantastic. It does get more expensive this way, but gives you more flavours to play with and would suit different types of salads.
I then had it in a saag aloo paneer, where the salty paneer cheese was replaced with the tofu feta. I used fresh and frozen spinach, garlic, herbs and spices, and a few potatoes and it came out beautifully. I’d imagine it would go well in a korma as well.
We still have half a jar leftover now of the improved version, so we’re thinking of crumbling it up and having it on pizza. I’d say it would work well it grilled as you might a haloumi, or added onto a kebab.
Don’t waste the olive oil either – it’s now beautifully infused with your herb mixture for use on salads, for dipping bread into or for boosting the flavours in a dip (think: pesto, hummus or with dukkah). If you are using fresh ingredients like garlic in the oil then be aware that it can go off.
