About the Recipe
For me, a great weekday meal is a bowl like this: it has all the things I want to be eating, without making me feel sedated during the day. I know everyone has some version of this they make, and I'm leaving this up as a foundation that you can base yourself on. There are so many ways to make rice bowls, you can add different proteins, toppings, different types of rice, omit the rice and change for noodles, etc. etc. This is just one way that I like to throw together the ingredients I have into something delicious. The star of this meal is certainly the peanut sauce, I could literally eat it by the spoonful.
Ingredients
For the Bowl:
1 pack of firm tofu
Sushi rice
A green of choice (here you see spinach)
Orange, yellow, or red peppers
Persian cucumbers
Avocado
Pickled shallots
Furikake or sesame seeds
For the Sauce:
3 tbsps peanut butter
1 tbsp miso paste
2 tbsp tahini
Splash of ponzu or soy sauce (if using soy sauce add lime juice)
1 tbsp honey
Splash of rice vinegar
Chili oil or chili crisp
Splash of sesame oil
A little hot water to thin it out if necessary
Preparation
Make your sauce by combining the ingredients and mixing together. If it proves too thick, add a little bit of hot water to thin it out until it's the consistency you desire. This sauce is very forgiving.
Cook your rice - just get it over with, it can sit there and wait while the other stuff goes.
Preheat the oven to 350ºF.
Dry and cut your tofu. You can do stripes, cubes, cut it into eighths - as your heart desires. Toss in a little cornstarch, salt, and black pepper, and then add it to a baking tray. Brush on some of the sauce to each piece.
Bake your tofu for ~25 minutes.
Start to prepare your bowl once the rice is done.
Chop up your veggies (cucumbers, avocado, peppers) or whatever veggies you wanna throw in there.
A step I like to add is a quick pickle of the peppers. If you have pickling liquid in your fridge (which I highly recommend you keep on hand) toss in your sliced peppers while you assembly the rest of the bowl (~15 minutes). They won't change in texture, but they'll be a little sour and tangy - which I like.
Once the tofu is ready take it out of the oven and add it to your bowl.
Sprinkle in furikake and add your sauce on top - enjoy!