Something old, something new...

Sometimes life throws you a challenge. My current challenge (well, the non-work-related one) is... vegetarian chili. That's not too bad, you say? That depends, I say.
I've made chili before, and it's basically an easy dish. But the version I'm going for now is actually low-carb vegan chili, due to several different persons with several different food issues that I would like to feed at the same time, out of one pot. And I am, very much, a meat person. I like the strong tastes and the taste mixture of meat with beans and tomato in a chili, very much so. I also like the texture of minced meat in the chili. And while beans are not that high in carbohydrates, they are high enough that I felt a need to put in something beside bean and tomato. Well, apart from my being sort of suspicious that it would be a little... bland otherwise.

So yesterday, I've bought tofu for the first time in my life, and though I've eaten tofu before (not much of that though) I have found out, this morning, why so many recipes talk about marinating it before using it. There was that time, at a living history event, when a piece of wood whittled off of something had fallen into my food bowl. (There's perils as well as joy in sharing camp with a very dedicated woodworker.) Wood, let me tell you, at least when it's fresh and not a weird wood like strongly resinated pine or juniper, tastes like... nothing. Sort of blandness personified.

The only difference to that piece of tofu I tried this morning? (I tried it raw and straight out of the bag, because I am a daring person and wanted to know how bad it possibly could be.) The wood was harder to chew. And probably contained less protein. So at the moment, a bit of tofu is hanging out in some marinade, and later on I shall put a bit of it into a pan and fry it to within an inch of its life... and then see whether my chili project will fly, walk, crawl, or jump over a friendly cliff into the ocean and sink like a stone.

(In the event that it should fly, I promise you the recipe. Should it totally tank, I will never speak of it again, though... so if you want a recipe, keep your fingers crossed for me!)