杏仁豆腐

[Bob Dylan Thomas]

xingren doufu is one of my favourite Chinese dishes - when i used to live in Tianjin it consisted of a few big chunks of piping hot tofu with a fairly sweet dark sauce and carrot, cucumbers and (of course) whole almonds. then i ordered the same thing in Taiwan, which came as silken tofu strongly scented with a sweet almond flavour, usually served with shaved ice (刨冰). the sweet taiwanese version was even better than the savoury mainland dish.

my question is, has anyone seen the sweet shaved ice version in the mainland? i always consider myself a tofu master, but was fairly rattled by the totally different dishes with the same name. also, how do the taiwanese get that brilliant fragrant taste into the tofu?

[889]

If I ordered 杏仁豆腐 xingren doufu I'd expect what you got in Taiwan, made with soft, smooth 豆花 douhua. Just put 杏仁豆腐 into Google Images and see what pictures come back!

The fragrant taste is probably almond extract.

[skylee]

In HK, it is like the Taiwan version without the ice but with some mixed sweetened canned fruit.

I didn't know about the hot version.

[Ian_Lee]

Actually the doufu in the dessert 杏仁豆腐 is actually not doufu but gelatin.

[Bob Dylan Thomas]

curses! my favourite dish ruined! the deception! how dare they! i can't believe it was gelatine all along. never again will i be able to make the ol' "我爱吃豆腐" joke (possibly a blessing) - "我爱吃明胶" just ain't the same.

if Taiwan was a member of the EU this would never have happened. The EU even made the name "soya milk" illegal; our cartons here in the UK are now labelled "soya based alternative to dairy drink". and now i'm grateful for it, at least you know what you're getting (sort of).

mind you... 杏仁明胶 doesn't sound too appetising either.

[skylee]

hmm... we call it 大菜糕. Does 杏仁大菜糕 sound better?