Ingredients for Sweet & Sour Tofu

Video Transcript

"Hi, I'm Chef A. Jaye and welcome to Expert Village. I'm now going to make a sauce for the sweet and sour tofu. You start with a twenty-ounce can of crushed pineapple, in its own juice--we certainly don't need any extra sugar--and I'm just draining this over a bowl. Give it a little squeeze when it gets towards the end to get every last bit of juice out of it. This pineapple you can save for desserts or smoothies--I'm actually going to use it in another recipe. I make a pineapple fried rice, so definitely save that. But as luck would have it, I need about one and a half cups of pineapple juice, and this can perfectly provides it for me. If you have pineapple juice, you certainly could just use one and a half cups of pineapple juice. I'm going to put it in a saucepan and I'm going to turn the heat on to medium-high. And to that, I'm going to add a quarter-cup of ketchup, and I like to use an organic brand. I'm going to use a quarter-cup of a brown rice vinegar, and I always try to use a brand that doesn't have extra sugar or extra salt. I'm going to just start whisking that together, as I said, over medium-high heat. Now this is sweet and sour, so therefore we've got the sour from the vinegar--we are going to need something for the sweet. So, I have a half of a cup of agave nectar--raw agave nectar, which is considered a low glycemic sweetener; it is much sweeter than sugar--better for you than white sugar--so you can use a lot less. It's made from the cactus plant. Agave is to the cactus as maple syrup is to the maple tree. I'm going to use a half a cup, and remember, if you want things sweeter, add a little more; less sweet, add a little less. Traditionally a sweet and sour dish is made with white sugar, or possibly brown sugar. Then, I'm going to add two cloves of garlic, in a press. I like things more incorporated than just having like little minced chunks. It just--to my palette, that tastes better. And next is some ginger. Fresh ginger--it's a root, it looks like this. I'm going to use about a one-inch piece. We're just going to have to peel off the skin. The skin is very tough, and it does not taste good, so you definitely want to peel ginger before using it. Ginger has gone back thousands of years for its many healing, medicinal properties. It's often used to make teas to calm the stomach and aid in digestion, and it's really good in this recipe."