The salads of my people
During Passover, observant (or even kinda-observant) Jews do not eat leavened bread. This means no subs, no doughnuts, no pizza--and no croutons in your salad.
Until now! For I have invented the breadless crouton to spare my people and the righteous and health-conscious gentiles from boring salads! Let me show you it.
Take a block of extra-firm tofu and drain it. I realize I have been putting up a lot of tofu recipes where I say to drain the tofu, and I haven't explained how to do that. Not very empowering of me! You can drain tofu in a lot of different ways, but here's what I do: put a flat cheese grater over a bowl, put the tofu on the grater, put a flat-bottomed bowl or plate on the tofu, and put a can of beans or something in the bowl. Let sit for 30 minutes or longer. The idea is to press some of the liquid out of the tofu, and give it somewhere to drain into--them's the technical specs, work it out as you will.
Heat the oven to 400. Cut the drained tofu into cubes about 1/2" all around. Spread them out on a nonstick baking sheet. You can spray them with olive oil Pam, but you don't have to. Sprinkle heavily with onion powder, garlic powder, and anything else you like--Cavendar's would be good, and I like cumin because it nicely complexifies tastes. (If you feel that cumin body-odorifies tastes, then don't use cumin.) Bake for about 25 minutes, turning once, until croutons are nice and chewy.
A spinach salad with tofu croutons? Hello, can you say nutrition? Have one of these for lunch and you'll realize what Popeye's been on about all that time.
Who is Miss Conduct?
Robin Abrahams writes the weekly "Miss Conduct" column for The Boston Globe Magazine. Robin, who has a PhD in psychology from Boston University, has worked as a theater publicist, organizational-change communications manager, editor, stand-up comedian, and professor of psychology and English. She lives in Cambridge with her husband, Marc Abrahams, founder of the Ig Nobel Prizes, which are given annually for achievements that first make people laugh and then make them think.
