Tastebuds

One thing that being vegan has done is given me a new appreciation for flavor. Among the cookbooks I bought in my born-again fervor in late December was This Can't Be Tofu! by Deborah Madison, whose Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone I've had for years. Tofu isn't new to me, either -- I've been using it ever since I stopped eating meat in 1997, most often in stir-fries. It's a great vehicle for flavor, and it's a chameleon of texture depending on what kind you buy and how you prepare it -- though I admit I haven't explored its possibilities too much until now.

I once tried making a mock-chicken salad with tofu from another cookbook that was just eh. I've already written about Deborah Madison's vegan mayonnaise from This Can't Be Tofu!, but the next recipe I tried from that book was the Curried "Chicken" Salad. It doesn't really taste like chicken salad -- even less so than the eh recipe. In consistency it might actually be a little closer to a chunky egg salad. But man, is it delicious. It should just be called curried tofu salad. Why does it have to be anything else?

What makes it so wonderful is the aromatic, green (even when not literally green), fresh flavors -- lime juice and zest, scallions, celery, subtly garlicky homemade mayo (see above), and lots of chopped flat-leaf parsley. (I've never really appreciated fresh parsley, as I so rarely buy it, and when I do, I tend to toss it into something cooked.) It also calls for curry powder and a tablespoon of mango chutney. Who has mango chutney lying around? I skipped that and didn't even miss it.

Then the other day I was in Trader Joe's with D., and -- having no idea that the recipe called for it -- he picked up a jar and said out of the blue (because when has chutney even been part of our discourse?), "Here's mango chutney with ginger." Um, okay . . . thanks!

So I made the salad again last night with that added, and it was even better: a little background sweetness for the other flavors, none of them overpowering. My fingers smelled gently of lime and curry powder and parsley when I went to bed. But best of all of this is the flavors -- they remind me of a spring picnic. Not a bad thing amid the gray-crusted curbsides of February.

This salad on homemade bread has become my favorite sandwich to take to work -- and yes, I have been taking lunch more often, which is another bonus. Today it was accompanied by peanut-butter oatmeal cookies (vegan, yummy, and made by me from this cool cookbook) as well as one of those perfect Mineola tangelos whose rind comes off with ease, whose wedges fall away effortlessly, and whose juice is as tangy as a kiss from someone to whom you have no resistance whatsoever.