Mapo Tofu

     It's always nice to find simple recipes in cooking magazines. Half the time they require ridiculous ingredients with insane direction. "Lightly lambaste a pre-pubescent hedgehog for 16 hours before braising another 12 hours in a reduction of leprechaun tears and the sweat of an owlbear." I hate that sort of shit. Give me a nice simple recipe involving simple ingredients. If I can bang it out in under 30 minutes, that's even better. This is one of those recipes. This came together in about 20 minutes and was plenty tasty. I like that options for the harder to find ingredients were provided. Naturally, I took liberties with the recipe. The end result was plenty tasty and very filling. We'll call it a winner and add it to the rotation. As always, notes and changes are in blue.

Mapo Tofu
via Food and Wine Magazine

Ingredients

• 1 teaspoon canola oil (omitted)
• 1/2 lb. ground beef chuck (85% lean) (That didn't happen. I went with about a pound and a quarter of 73/27 ground beef)
• 1/2 pound ground pork (omitted. I figure I'd go straight beef for this)
• Kosher salt (I try to limit salt intake, so I omitted it)
• 2 Tbsp. chile bean sauce, preferably tobojan dijan (Nope. I did have black bean garlic sauce, which I used instead)
• 2 Tbsp. homemade sriracha. Use store bought if you prefer.
• 2 Tbsp. hoisin sauce or tenmenjan (soybean paste) (We had the hoisin on hand so that's what we used.)
• 1 Tbsp. soy sauce
• One 14-ounce package soft tofu, drained and finely diced
• 1-1/2 tsp. cornstarch
• 1/2 cup water
• 3 scallions, finely chopped
• white rice for serving

Directions

1. Heat a large pan until hot (if you can heat it until it's cold, you've done something wrong). Add the oil, followed by the beef and pork (since the beef was a touch fatty, I just omitted the oil). Season with salt and cook over high heat, stirring and breaking up the meat until crumbly and lightly browned, about 3 minutes (if you used higher fat meat like we did, remember to drain the grease)
2. Stir in the chile-bean sauce, hoisin and soy sauce (and the sriracha, if you're using it) and cook, stirring for 3 minutes; gently fold in the tofu.
3. In a small bowl, whisk the cornstarch into the water. Add to the pan and simmer until the sauce thickens, about 2 minutes.
4. Stir in the scallions and serve.

Good times!