Tofu & veggie stirfry in orange sauce

Yes, I'm still on my Asian food kick. And so you can imagine my delight at coming upon the "noodlemania" feature in the most recent issue of Vegetarian Times (April/May 2011), which offers recipes for 5 Asian noodle dishes to "rev up weeknight meals." It's like this magazine always knows what I'm craving.

I took one look at the main dish - a bowl of broccoli, browned cubes of tofu, and flat noodles - and decided I needed it. But instead of going with their Thai-inspired coconut sauce, I opted for an orange sauce I saw over at vegalicious. I'm always intrigued when sauces incorporate fruit; maybe because it's slightly out of my comfort zone, both in taste preference and culinary know-how. But when it's done right, it's a nice change from the familiar, and this orange sauce looked basic enough to not mess up.


Another substitution I made was soba noodles in place of fettucini. It's not that I don't like fettucini, but I wanted a traditional Asian noodle, and my local Italian grocer only had soba noodles, so that is what I chose. Now I don't have much experience with them, but I do know soba noodles are often served either cold or in broth. I'm not exactly sure why they're not used like rice noodles...perhaps because the unique texture of hand-made soba noodles is best appreciated cold. But then why are they sometimes served in broth, or what if you're not cooking with the hand-made kind? These are questions Wikipedia has left me wanting to know.

While I continue to ponder such thoughts, I'll leave you with my pieced together, highly experimental, nontraditional recipe...which I think came together surprisingly well. The cornstarch adds a nice body to the sauce, which bears a hint of orange, tempering the saltiness of soy and sesame oil.  The sauce clung to the soba noodles, giving the dish an overall consistency and satiating quality that might just prompt me to categorize it as a comfort food.

Serves: 3-4

- Ingredients -

Sauce
juice from 1 large orange (about 1/3 cup)
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1/4 cup soy sauce
small piece fresh ginger, grated
dash cayenne

Stirfry
3 tablespoons sesame oil
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 pkg frozen broccoli florets
1 red bell pepper, cut in slivers
1/2 block extra firm tofu, cut into cubes
3 oz soba noodles (I used Roland Organic)

- Instructions -

1. Cook soba noodles according to package instructions. When finished, drain and rinse in cold water.
2. To make sauce, whisk together all ingredients in a bowl and set aside.
3. Heat 2 tablespoons oil in a frying pan over medium high heat. Toss in cubed tofu and cook until lightly browned and slightly crisp, turning with a metal spatula so all sides brown evenly.  Remove from pan and place on a plate covered with a paper towel.
2. Heat 1 tablespoon oil and add in crushed garlic. Toss in red bell pepper and broccoli. Cook until veggies are heated through, about 8-10 minutes. Toss in tofu, soba noodles, and sauce. Cook for an additional 1-2 minutes until sauce is evenly coated.