How tofu made it to America, was disparaged for decades but went mainstream when 1960s counterculture exploded
- Founding father Benjamin Franklin was fascinated with soybeans, and Asian immigrants ate tofu in the 1800s while working on the railways and after the gold rush
- In the 1960s the US soybean industry’s growth and the rise of the counterculture ignited interest in vegetarianism, and today tofu is common in US supermarkets
Nestled among street stalls in Hong Kong’s working-class Sham Shui Po district is one of the city’s oldest tofu makers.
It’s 1am and staff at Kung Wo Tofu Factory are busy at work using a stone mill to grind pre-soaked soybeans. The process of making tofu is laborious: the ground mixture is boiled, then strained, before it is pressed into cubes fresh for the morning’s customers.
“We make around 5,000 pieces of tofu every day. We don’t want to add any preservatives to our product; we prefer to make it fresh,” says Kung Wo director Renee So.
The company has been making tofu in Hong Kong for almost 130 years. A narrow alleyway separates the factory into two shopfronts. On the left, customers buy the fresh tofu products – from cubes of freshly made tofu and dried tofu puffs to yuba, or tofu skin. On the right, customers can grab a bite to eat, ordering dishes such as pan-fried tofu with fish paste, deep-fried tofu and even tofu ice cream.
“Tofu is very special because you can prepare it like us in a fast, local street-food way, but you can also put it on a [high-end restaurant] menu for a very high price. Tofu itself is very flexible, it depends how the chef wants to present it to the customer,” So says.
Tofu is deeply ingrained in the culinary landscape of Hong Kong and mainland China. Unlike in the West, it is not usually considered as a meat substitute, but rather just another great source of protein.
