Easy Honey Garlic Tofu Recipe
Today we are making a Honey Garlic Tofu Recipe! But what is this exactly? This easy recipe is a take on Honey Garlic Chicken, which is a Chinese dish that combines garlic and honey in a sweet and salty coating, then coated on chicken. When serving, it is best to sprinkle green onions and sesame seeds on top! However, to make it vegan I used tofu coated in a maple syrup and garlic sauce.
The tofu taste is bland, just like a piece of chicken, until it is covered in coating. Once it is coated in this sticky, savory sauce, the cubed tofu acts like a sponge and absorbs all the flavours inside! The recipe is also not one to deep fry in hot oil – instead, we make pan-fried tofu. To make the recipe gluten-free too, I used gluten-free flour and it works just as well as gluten all-purpose flour.
Why You’ll Love This Crispy Honey Garlic Tofu Recipe
Sweet Saucy & Salty Coating: This sticky sauce is made of simple ingredients: pure maple syrup, oil, tamari for saltiness and minced fresh garlic. We then simmer it to make it thick. The tofu is turned golden brown, then coated in this sauce!
Twice Crisped Tofu: The coated tofu cubes are double dipped in the flavourful flour mixture! This makes it so much crispier when pan-frying, giving it a crunch (more like fried chicken versus tofu) coated in a honey garlic sauce.
Super Filling – Serve on Grains: This recipe is very filling, especially when served as a part of the main course over a bed of grains, such as white rice, brown rice, wild rice, quinoa, couscous and so on. Add in a side of crunchy broccoli and greens for a whole meal – grains, proteins, veggies!
All About the Preparation
There are quite a few steps to this recipe if you check out the preparation in the recipe card. It doesn’t take as long as it looks! A lot of the ingredients are also spices, so if you have a spice rack in your kitchen you can grab a lot of the ingredients from one area.
We start with the Sauce: The “honey garlic” sauce uses sauteed garlic in oil, followed by tamari, black pepper and maple syrup.
Then we make the Dry Mixture: The dry mixture uses gluten free all purpose flour (you can substitute this with regular all purpose flour as well. I tested it out gluten free to make sure it does work really well for the non-gluten folks)! Then we add a slew of spices for the flavour.
Follow this with the Wet Mixture: The wet mixture helps to hold the dry mixture in place. This is some non-dairy milk with spices. We will need this to double-dip our tofu pieces! The double-dip step gives it the extra crunchiness we need.
All About the Tofu
Pan-frying the tofu: I don’t looove deep-frying food in my house. It makes the entire house smell like oil, a smell which gets into all of my clothing too. Not to mention a lot of oil used! Instead, I opted to pan fry these. A thin layer of oil over the entire pan was enough to get these to fry really well. Don’t skimp on the oil – you need it to get that fried texture! I would say a medium to thin layer should be good.
Extra Firm Tofu: We also need to make sure to use extra-firm tofu here to get the tofu crispy! This has the most “meatiest” texture, as well as the most amount of protein (for those who care).
Optional Toppings: You can optionally top this with white sesame seeds and green onion (as I did in the picture). Otherwise, it still tastes amazing as is!
Substitutions
Sweet Smoked Paprika: Substitute regular smoked paprika.
Olive Oil: Any other neutral oil, such as avocado oil, can be a substitute.
Garlic Powder: Garlic salt is a substitute, but in that case omit the pink salt. Garlic salt does have garlic in it, so extra salt can be added at the end if needed.
Milk: Any other non-dairy neutral flavoured milk such as cashew milk can work.
Flour: I used a 1:1 substitute of gluten-free all-purpose flour for this recipe. However, regular all-purpose flour is also an option (it would not be gluten-free in that case).
Maple Syrup: I used 100% pure maple syrup. The best substitute would be agave syrup. Other healthy liquid sweeteners could be coconut syrup or brown rice syrup, which carry different tastes than maple syrup though.
Tamari: Tamari is a reduced sodium version of soy sauce. You can use soy sauce instead, but adjust the amount accordingly. If using light soy sauce, use a little less than the tamari called for. If using dark soy sauce, use even less. This can be an estimate initially, tasting as you go along.
Honey Garlic Tofu Recipe Notes
- To make this recipe with reduced sodium, use reduced sodium tamari.
- If time permits, leave the tofu block in a tofu press overnight to squeeze out the excess moisture. This will make it even crispier when you cook it, yielding the best results! If short on time, at least cover the tofu in a cloth or paper towel and keep it pressed down with a heavy object for an hour or so.
- For best results, the right tofu type should be used. Make sure to use extra-firm tofu! This type of tofu has a lot less excess water than other types of tofu.
More New Recipes You’ll Love
Chinese Eggplant & Potatoes: This Chinese dish is Di San Xian, a Chinese eggplant and potatoes stir fry!
Egg Fried Rice: Chickpea gram flour makes a vegan “scrambled egg” in this recipe, which is a great way to mimic that “eggy” texture!
Fettuccine Pad Thai: This Pad Thai recipe uses fettuccine noodles for a bit of a different recipe versus regular rice vermicelli. The thick fettuccine noodles are fantastic in this under-30-minutes recipe!
Pav Bhaji: This is an Indian dish based on potatoes with Indian spices, served with a type of bread called pav.
Garlic Butter Vegan Noodles Recipe: One of the easiest meal recipes, with vegan butter and minced garlic sauteed, then coated in cooked noodles!
If you make this Honey Garlic Tofu Recipe, leave a comment and star rating! Don’t forget to tag your photos @peanut_palate on Instagram. Enjoy!
Honey Garlic Tofu Recipe
Equipment
- Nonstick skillet
- Spatula
- Stovetop Pot
Ingredients
For the Dry Mixture
- 1 cup gluten free all purpose flour
- 1 scant tsp pink salt
- 1 tsp black pepper
- ¼ scant tsp ground nutmeg
- 1½ tsp ground ginger
- 1 tsp dried thyme
- ¼ tsp chili powder
- 1 tbsp paprika
- 1 tsp sweet smoked paprika
- ½ tsp garlic powder
For the Wet Mixture
- ½ cup unsweetened oat milk
- ¼ tsp pink salt
- ¼ tsp black pepper
- ½ tsp paprika
For the Honey Garlic Sauce
- ½ cup 100% pure maple syrup
- 1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- 2 tbsp tamari
- 2 medium cloves minced garlic
- ½ tsp black pepper
Other Ingredients
- 1 block extra-firm tofu cut into cubes
- extra-virgin olive oil for pan frying
For the Topping
- 1 green onion, chopped
- 1-2 tsp white sesame seeds
Instructions
For the Sauce
- First make the sauce. Heat up a stovetop pot over medium heat. Add the oil and garlic. Sautee the garlic until it is lightly toasted (lightly browned), then add the remaining ingredients.
- Turn the heat to low and stir it around for a minute. The mixture will thicken and you can set it aside after a minute. If it is too syrupy (it depends on the type of maple syrup you're using), continue to stir it until thickened for another 1-2 minutes if needed.
For the Tofu
- Press down the tofu with a heavy item and covered in a cloth. Leave it for at least an hour to squeeze the extra water out. Either this, or leave it overnight in a tofu press. Skipping this step will results in not-so-crispy tofu! Once the extra liquid has been removed, cut the tofu into cubes as in the photos.
- Take two separate bowls, large enough to toss the tofu in.
- Add all the dry mixture ingredients to one bowl and the wet mixture ingredients to the other. Stir both bowls to combine the ingredients.
- Take the tofu cubes and coat each cube in the dry mixture using a fork. Then coat it in the wet mixture. Repeat this twice to double coat each tofu piece.
- Once all the tofu pieces have been coated, warm up a nonstick skillet over medium heat with the oil – make sure the oil is evenly spread over the pan. I didn't give a specific amount in the ingredient list because it depends on how big your pan is. You'll want enough to coat the entire pan with a medium-thin layer of oil.
- Once warm, add in the tofu pieces one by one. Do not overcrowd it or add the pieces on top of each other – leave some room between each piece.
- Tilt the pan to coat the tofu evenly in oil if needed. Then set it back on the heat and allow the tofu to cook for a few minutes.
- Once the tofu has nicely browned on one side (you can turn a few pieces over to check), flip each piece over and allow the other side to cook.
- Wait a few minutes for the other side of the tofu to brown. Once all the tofu is cooked on both sides, add the pieces into the sauce.
- Make sure to evenly coat each piece with the sauce. Let the tofu sit in this sauce for a few minutes to absorb the flavour.
- Top with green onions and sesame seeds (optional). Serve warm!
- I would not recommend storing these overnight or to serve at a later time. They will likely get soggy, and are best eaten fresh. The most you may be able to do is fry up the tofu pieces first, and coat the sauce on right when you are ready to serve.
Notes
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Storage
- See the preparation notes above.
