- So I haven't had fish in like 10 years,
but you are a more recent vegan.
So you tried one and?
- You really like fish.
(soft music)
- All right, we recently made salmon
and then I got some requests for fish sticks.
So that's what we're doing.
Hey guys, I'm Candice the Edgy Veg
and welcome back to my channel.
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Like I said, a couple of weeks ago,
I tested out some fellow bloggers' salmon recipes,
vegan salmon, tofu salmon,
and I got some requests for fish sticks.
So today we're going to make that.
I took kind of what I learned from some of those recipes
that I tested the other week,
plus a marinade that I have for my own salmon recipe
for salmon lox and I kind of mashed them all together
and this is what I've come up with.
So the base of our fish sticks is going to be tofu.
I have pressed this, you definitely want to press it
for at least half an hour.
So whether that's in a tofu press or wrap it up
and put a bunch of heavy things on top of it,
it's really up to you.
But I want to start with the marinade.
So, like I said, I use a lot of inspiration
from the recipes that we tested the other week,
plus my own salmon lox marinade
to come up with this that I think is very interesting.
So in the blender, everything's done in the blender
which we love, we're gonna add some water,
olive oil, miso, I think any recipe that has to do with,
you know, fishyness this should definitely have that.
I have some seasoned rice vinegar, caper brine,
trust the process, lemon juice,
and then some old bay seasoning and bullion.
And of course, always, some sort of seaweed.
I'm just using nori.
If you have like kombu, you can use that
or wakame or whatever seaweed that you want,
but, I mean, nori is pretty inexpensive
and easy to find everywhere.
And then just go ahead and blend them.
So definitely blend it for like at least 30 seconds.
So you'll end up with this
kind of like muddy looking marinade.
For the next part, you want to pour a little bit
of the marinade onto or into some sort of vessel
that's going to be big enough to hold all of your tofu.
I find that like a casserole dish
or a baking dish is really great for this.
But you just want to pour some
to cover the bottom completely.
That, and the rest we're going to save
to pour on top of our tofu after.
So you can set this aside while we prepared the tofu.
All right, so like I said earlier,
our fish part is going to be,
or I guess the base of our fish is going to be tofu.
I've pressed this, definitely make sure that you press it,
and you just want to slice it into like,
like half an inch slices.
So you'll end up with something that looks like this.
I mean, they're more like fish rectangles
than fish sticks, I guess.
All right, so now you just kind of want to line them up.
So I like to do kind of mid section to mid section.
So I'll do, like this.
I'm gonna grab some chopsticks,
put them on either side and then we're just going to slice.
So just slice it across,
this is going to help you not go too far.
So you want them to look like something like that
and you can do some super thin ones,
but don't go too, too thin
because I find that then they get super delicate.
You just want to mimic that flakiness.
And if you watched the video a couple of weeks ago,
you'll remembered that this is how
Sam from It Doesn't Taste Like Chicken made her salmon.
And you can slide those chopsticks down.
- All right, so then go ahead
and just place them into your sheet here.
I like to do them cut side up
just because they're super delicate
and that way I can like scoop them
from the bottom without breaking them in any way.
But you just want to place them in there
with enough space for marinade to get in between
But be very careful cause they're very delicate.
And then you could just pour
the rest of that marinade all over.
Make sure that you're covering each one.
And then let that marinade for an hour.
All right, so our fake fish, vegan fish, tofu
has been marinating, so I'm going to bread it.
There's a couple of ways that you can cook this.
You can bread it and throw it in the oven.
You can bread it and deep fry it.
You can bread it and fry it on your stove.
Air fry it.
It's really up to you.
But no matter how you decide to cook it,
this like breading part is going to be the same.
So in a bowl here, I have some soy milk, some flour,
and then I have panko breadcrumbs
as well as like regular bread breadcrumbs.
Yes, sure.
And for seasoning, I'm just gonna use the old bay
because it's pre-seasoned or it's like a seasoning mix.
Why would I tell you to like mix
like five other seasonings together
when this already goes so well with like fishy flavors.
So I'm just going to whisk that.
So I like to have everything prepared
before I do the next step of using the nori
to create like a fish skin.
I just want everything ready to go
because you want to move fairly quickly at this process.
I just have a normal baking sheet here.
I like to use a silicone baking mat.
You can also use parchment paker, paker, parchment paper,
and you want to grease it.
I'm just using like Pam, just a cooking spray.
You can also use like a vegan butter
if you want, or just oil.
But I would use like a neutral oil,
something like avocado or vegetable oil.
And definitely do this generously
because we kind of want to make sure
that we are getting like that fry effect without frying.
So now we're going to add the skin if you will.
So just take a sheet nori.
I'm putting it just right on a cutting board here.
And I'm going to paint it with some of the marinade,
just to help it stick to the tofu.
Just adding a bit of that marinade
just helps everything stick together.
You can use a generous amount,
you've got tons of marinade there.
You'll need one to two sheets for this.
And then very carefully because
everything's really delicate at this point,
you want to go in and grab your tofu very delicately.
You don't want the nori to go on the top where it's cut,
you want it to go on the bottom.
So what I like to do is just like,
stick it on the nori here and then followed by the next one,
but leave just enough space that you can cut between them.
Make sure that you're shaking off the excess
because we already have marinated on there.
And I mean, you can use this marinade for other things.
You don't have to use tofu.
I mean, if you like to make hearts of palm,
like fish tacos or something, you can use this for that,
or like fish and chips using something else,
maybe like eggplant, you can use this marinade.
All right, so you should have something
that looks like this.
I'm just gonna wash my hands.
Oh, and if you do a lot of cooking,
like go on Amazon and like get like bartending towels.
They're so much better than regular dish towels.
Just side note.
Now I find the easiest way to do this
is with a pizza cutter.
This is a super short pizza cutter.
Cut between the pieces of tofu.
And I also like to just, you know,
cut off the excess 'cause then you're getting
just the exact size, which, I mean, that's what you want.
Instead of sitting there like trying to guess
and cutting each little individual square
and then putting it on there.
All right, so you should end up
with something that looks like this.
You have your slits on one side,
you have your nori on the other.
Dip it into your flour.
Be very gentle, they're they're pretty delicate.
Shake off the excess,
put it into your soy milk or aquafaba
or egg replacer or whatever it is that you're using.
Throw it into the bread crumbs
and definitely pat the breadcrumbs on.
And then you can go ahead and just put this,
nori side down, onto your baking sheet.
And repeat.
To help everything stick, I am, you know,
if it's really dry, the nori is really dry,
I'm just going to brush it
with a little bit of extra marinade.
We got our flour, throw it into our soy
and then just coat it.
I mean, heck just make a beer batter
and make some beer battered fish with this.
Okay, so you have them on your pan, it's well greased.
Now spray them with more cooking spray on the top,
just so that you get that,
I mean, you don't have to,
but this will be dry versus if you spray it,
it'll be nice and crispy and you get that
deep fried effect without actually having to deep fry.
Okay, now put them in,
now put them in the oven for six minutes
and then flip them and then put them back
for like six minutes.
Bye, get a nice tan.
Oh, look at that flakiness.
Ahhhh, it's flaky, look at that.
All right, that flakiness is everything.
I have some tartar sauce here,
so we're going to try it with that,
but you can just do like a squeeze of lemon
or whatever your favorite dip is for fish sticks.
Oh my god.
It's like soft and flaky and like,
oh my god, this is, definitely make this.
This is so good.
Mmm, mhmm.
I wouldn't even say, do this overnight,
like marinade overnight
'cause then the tofu really breaks down
and it'll be even flakier.
Honestly guys, 10 out of 10.
Honestly, like one of my favorite recipes
I've made in a while.
I mean chicken nuggets who?
It's time for fish sticks.
The recipe for this will be in the description box
down below along with the tartar sauce.
And if you're new here, hit the subscribe button,
do the like thing, you know, turn on the notifications,
all of that jazz.
And I'll see you next time.
Oh, and if you have recipe requests
you can leave them in comments section.
Okay, bye.