Hot and sour soup with tofu

• 25 minutes
• Prep 10 minutes
• Cook 15 minutes
• Serves 4

Our own recipe. The photograph is AI-generated.

• Vegan
• Vegetarian
• Gluten free
• Dairy free

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
• 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
• 15g ginger, peeled and cut into thin matchsticks
• 150g chestnut mushrooms, thinly sliced
• 1 litre vegetable stock (check the label if you need it gluten free)
• 1 tin (225g) bamboo shoots, drained and cut into thin strips
• 200g firm tofu, cut into thin strips
• 3 tablespoons tamari (a soy sauce made without wheat)
• 4 tablespoons rice vinegar
• 1 teaspoon caster sugar
• Half a teaspoon ground white pepper
• Half a teaspoon chilli flakes
• 2 tablespoons cornflour
• 2 spring onions, thinly sliced

Let's cook

1. Heat the oil in a large pan on a medium heat. Add the garlic and ginger and stir for 1 minute until fragrant.
2. Add the mushrooms and cook for 3 minutes, stirring, until they soften.
3. Pour in the stock and add the bamboo shoots and tofu. Bring to the boil, then turn down and simmer gently for 5 minutes.
4. Stir in the tamari, rice vinegar, sugar, white pepper and chilli flakes.
5. In a cup, mix the cornflour with 4 tablespoons cold water until smooth. With the soup bubbling gently, pour it in slowly while stirring. Simmer for 1 to 2 minutes until the soup turns glossy and slightly thick.
6. Taste and balance it: add a splash more vinegar if you want it sharper, or a pinch more white pepper for more heat. Ladle into warm bowls and scatter over the spring onion.

Tips

• The heat comes mostly from the white pepper, so add it in two goes and taste.
• Stir the cornflour mix just before adding it, as it settles in the cup.
• Leftovers keep in the fridge for 2 days. Reheat until steaming hot; it may need a splash of water.

Swaps

• Classic egg ribbons: beat 1 egg and drizzle it slowly into the bubbling soup at the end while stirring; it then contains eggs and is not vegan.
• Deeper sourness: use Chinkiang black vinegar instead of rice vinegar, but most contain wheat, so it is then not gluten free.
• Milder: halve the white pepper and leave out the chilli flakes.

Tags

• soup
• chinese
• tofu
• mushrooms

In Plant powered.

Contains: Soya .

Contains soya, from the tamari and the tofu. Tamari is a soy sauce usually made without wheat, but check the bottle says gluten free. Stock cubes and stock pots can contain celery or wheat, so check the packet.

Check every packet for allergens.