Soy milk curdles, tradition does not
Print Edition
In the wee hours of the morning earlier this summer, stallholders at the Minma Wet Market in Maqiao Town were busy getting ready for the selling day. At the No. 103 stall, a new vendor was hard at work.
Qiao Changchun, 40, started making dried tofu at about 4am. As the mixer and beater whirred into action, the aroma of fresh soybean milk filled the air.
Qiao may have been a newcomer to the market on that day but he is no stranger to tofu-making. His family, one of the oldest in Maqiao, have been doing that for three generations. Maqiao dried tofu is known far and wide for its soft, juicy texture and light smoky flavor.
The preparation work is meticulous. The beans have to be clean, the brine has to be prepared to perfection and the dried tofu has to be boiled just so.
“I have been involved with dried tofu for nearly two decades,” said Qiao. “I once quit the family business when I thought it wasn’t a very profitable livelihood, but after a few years, I returned.”
Maqiao dried tofu is a sought-after delicacy in Shanghai. It came late in the town’s 1,000-year history, first appearing in the 1950s.
Since then, the dried tofu produced here has become distinctive from other kinds of tofu. It is thick with many small hollows in the middle, making it ideal for absorbing the juices of the pork or beef with which it is commonly cooked.
Wanghai Village is considered the birthplace of Maqiao dried tofu. Three families in the villages were said to make the best tofu in the village: the Lius, Caos and Qiaos.
“During 1950s, almost all families in the village had dried tofu workshops,” said Qiao. “In our family, my grandfather’s cousin started the business and later taught the skills to my father.”
When Qiao was a teenager, he never thought of taking over the family business. He went to work out of town, finding jobs in fish wholesaling and later clothing manufacture. But his heart was in tofu. In the mid-1990s, he decided to return home and get into the family business.
One of the first problems he had to tackle were brand pirates selling dried tofu under a false Maqiao label. He harked back to his days in the textile business, when labeling products was an important part of manufacturing. Why not imprint the Chinese characters for Qiao on each piece of dried tofu?
The idea was not only successful but was widely copied by other authentic tofu-makers in the village anxious to retain their reputations.
In 2008, Minhang designated Maqiao dried tofu as one of the district’s “intangible cultural heritages.” But the honor almost ruined the small family businesses that had built that heritage. Suddenly, big factories appeared to make Maqiao dried tofu. Although their products didn’t match the quality of the small workshops, the cheaper price appealed to a mass audience.
At the same time, rising costs for materials were eroding the profitability of the family workshops that remained. The Liu and Cao family operations closed down. Was Qiao the next in line to fold?
“We couldn’t raise prices much because then big factory products would be even more competitive, so gradually, our workshop slid into the red,” said Qiao. “After a lot of consideration, I finally decided to sell our family workshop to contractors from outside the town.”
He left the business at that point, never to return. Or so he thought. An incident 18 months ago changed his mind.
He had taken his family out to a local restaurant for dinner, and they ordered Maqiao dried tofu as one dish. The waitress told them that the restaurant served “authentic Maqiao dried tofu” and it was the best on the menu.
The taste of the tofu, however, was anything but authentic.
“It was not our dried tofu,” he said. “It was an abomination.”
Embittered, Qiao decided that he had to go back into the business, if for no other reason than to restore the family’s reputation. He decided there was no way to balance quality and quantity, so he would sacrifice the latter for the former.
He went back to the original workshop the family once ran in the wet market, refurbished it and purchased new equipment. He designed a new logo for the Qiao brand and went back to the basics of tofu-making that he learned from his father.
“The key to good texture and taste of Maqiao dried tofu is the timing and the quantity of ingredients. The bittern is added to the soy milk to make it curdle,” said Qiao. “Everything is done by machine in plants, creating a mediocre product.”
Bittern is the water solution of bromides, magnesium and calcium salts that remain after sodium chloride is crystallized out of seawater.
Qiao insists upon using only top-quality ingredients in his process.
“The cost is high but everything is worth it,” said Qiao. “Honestly, I don’t know where our workshop is headed, but I’m willing to give it a shot anyway.”
Boiled pork and Maqiao dried tofu
Ingredients:
Streaky pork
Maqiao dried tofu
Soy sauce
Sugar
Method: Chop the streaky pork into cubes and cut the dried tofu into halves. Fry the pork first and add soy sauce, sugar and water when the pork is half cooked. Transfer the pork to an earthenware pot and add the dried tofu. Make sure that the tofu is completely immersed in the sauce. Simmer on slow heat until the pork is tender.
Streaky pork can be substituted by knuckles, ribs or beef. Cooking times may have to be adjusted.
Stir fried Maqiao dried tofu with garlic sprouts
Ingredients:
Maqiao dried tofu
Garlic sprouts
Cooking wine
Soy sauce
Sugar
Salt to taste
Method: Cut the dried tofu into halves and stir-fry. Be careful not to crush the tofu when turning. When the tofu is almost done, add cooking wine, soy sauce, sugar and a little water. Simmer gently until the sauce bubbles. Then add garlic sprouts and season with a little salt. Cover and continue to simmer until the sprouts turn soft.
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