The Korean Vegan's Spicy & Crunchy Garlic Tofu (Kkanpoong Tofu) Recipe

Step 1

To a large bowl, add a pinch of salt and 2 tablespoons of potato starch to tofu chunks. Gently toss the tofu to make sure it's all evenly coated. Set aside.

Step 2

Prep your vegetables by mincing the garlic, dicing the onion, slicing the Korean chiles and chopping up the scallions.

Step 3

Prepare the sauce by mixing together gochugaru, soy sauce, white wine vinegar, maple syrup, mirin and 1 teaspoon of potato starch. Set aside.

Step 4

To a very large non-stick pan, add 4 tablespoons of vegetable oil over high heat. When oil is very hot, add coated tofu chunks in one layer, making sure they are not touching each other. If they touch, they will stick to one another.

Step 5

Cook the tofu and flip them one by one, until they are brown on all sides (approximately 7 minutes). Remove the tofu chunks from the pan and set them aside on a cooling rack to drain the excess oil. Repeat with the remaining tofu.

Step 6

When all of the tofu has been fried, in the same pan, add 1 tablespoon of oil. Then add the garlic, onions, chiles and scallions, and sauté the vegetables until the garlic starts to brown.

Step 7

Reduce the heat to medium-high and add the sauce, stirring it with a wooden spoon until it reduces down into a thick sauce, approximately 30 seconds. Turn off the heat.

Step 8

Gently add back the fried tofu and stir everything together, so that the tofu chunks are evenly coated in your sauce.

Step 9

Garnish the tofu with 1/2 tablespoon of sesame oil and toasted sesame seeds. Serve immediately.

Step 10

From The Korean Vegan Cookbook: Reflections and Recipes From Omma's Kitchen by Joanne Lee Molinaro, to be published on 10/12/2021 by Avery, an imprint of Penguin Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House, LLC. Copyright © 2021 Joanne Lee Molinaro.