Tempeh – fermented whole soy cakes – is extremely nutritious but not well-known in the West. This easy recipe makes this healthy, vegan protein much more accessible with a delicious miso and ginger glaze. Griddle or pan-fry and enjoy with the simple, spicy lime-dressed salad.
Tempeh is a true ugly duckling of the food world. I mean, just look at it. Not pretty.
Not as scary as it looks!
If you get past the kind of “brainy” looks of this cultured and whole form of soy there is also a matter of texture. Kind of odd. I can’t really compare it to anything in Western food traditions. Maybe a kind of bread-meat hybrid??
But, if you can see beyond the curious nature of this culinary oddbod, you will be handsomely rewarded. Where Western-style soy products are often not particularly healthy – very highly processed with some not always healthy compounds; mostly genetically engineered – tempeh is widely seen as much the healthiest way to consume soy. The many phytonutrients are further enhanced and made bioavailable (absorbed by the body) by fermentation. This is why we detect a “fresh bread” aroma when working with tempeh – until it is smothered in miso and sweet ginger glaze!
Soy will remain controversial for a number of reasons, especially for those with hormone-related cancers. However tempeh, along with miso, fermented tofu and natto, appear very strongly to highlight the cancer-preventing compounds while also dampening down mineral-inhibiting phytates found in more processed forms of soy (e.g commercial soy “dairy” products; most soy chunks, bacon and meat analogues).
My advice to the breast cancer patients that I see is to have organic, relatively unprocessed soy as part of a mixed and varied diet, if consumed at all. However, if you have been advised by your oncologist to avoid soy, then do follow this advice. Please see this excellent “layman’s” article on tempeh (and its link to their soy article). Scholarly links are below.
Sliced tempeh to be steamed before briefly marinating and griddling.
For the vast majority of people including foods like tempeh, organic, traditionally made tofu, and miso in the diet is very nutritious, giving us hard-to-find nutrients that are health-protective. But, its looks and texture can be a bit hard to sell. At least in my house. So, I have devised a few family-pleasing recipes to get this funny-looking food into our diet. Maybe you saw my Spicy Sofritas Burrito Bowl?
Even with my tempeh-sceptic family this was bowl-scrapingly good. And today’s healthy vegan recipe passed muster, too. Only the tempeh recipes (any recipes really!) that pass the all important family taste test make it onto the blog. Look out for a spicy flatbread pizza featuring this odd bod of a bean cake.
Here is a very small selection of scholarly articles on soy and cancer:
American Institute of Cancer Research
Clinical Nutrition and Metabolic Care
A very good overview on nutrition, lifestyle and breast cancer.
And, Diet, nutrition, physical activity and breast cancer survivors, World Cancer Research Fund International (a long pdf document overview of all evidence to date)
Do you eat tempeh? What’s your favourite way to eat it? Do you have to disguise it from your family??
Miso and Sweet Ginger Glazed Tempeh
Tempeh – fermented whole soy cakes – is extremely nutritious but not well-known in the West. This easy recipe makes this healthy, vegan protein much more accessible with a delicious miso and ginger glaze. Griddle or pan-fry and enjoy with the simple, spicy lime-dressed salad.
200g tempeh (I use Impulse brand, found in the freezer at Real Foods, Edinburgh), sliced into rashers
1 tbsp each white and brown miso, or all white
1 tbsp lime juice
1 tsp toasted sesame oil
2 tbsp rice vinegar (Chinese or Japanese vinegar)
1 tsp acacia honey or maple syrup
Salad and Dressing
1 rounded tsp grated gingerroot and its juice
1/2 green chilli, finely minced OR chilli oil
1 tsp toasted sesame oil
1 tsp tamari sauce, soy sauce, shoyu or coconut aminos (all salty sauces), optional
Juice 1 lime
Small drizzle of honey or maple syrup
Handful each of sliced sugar snap peas radishes
Two good handfuls of watercress/rocket/arugula (anything you like really)
1/4 cucumber, thinly sliced (I use about 3 mini cucumbers from Lidl)
1-2 chillies, thinly sliced
Method:
1. Steam the tempeh slices for five minutes. Let cool just enough to handle.
2. Meanwhile, mix together the marinade ingredients. When the tempeh is steamed, rub the marinade all over the tempeh. Cover and leave for 10 minutes to absorb the flavours.
3. Mix the gingerroot, minced chilli, sesame oil, lime and honey in a small bowl or jar.
4. Assemble the green salad between two plates.
5. Heat a griddle pan or saute pan on medium-high flame. If using a saute pan, add a tiny bit of oil. Slap on the tempeh slices and griddle or fry until browned in patches; flip carefully and brown some more. When cooked, lay alongside the green salad; top the tempeh with radish and chilli before pouring the dressing all over.
Note: tempeh cooked this way is also fantastic cut up and added to a grain salad for lunch, threaded with courgette and carrot ribbons and with toasted sesame seeds.
Soft food diet: the tempeh is suitable for most soft food diets.
To make up for the ugly tempeh images (I hope you aren’t scarred for life), how about some recent snaps I took on a July visit to the stupendously gorgeous, Jupiter Artland? The landform you see is designed by renowned landscape architect, Charles Jencks, husband of the late Maggie Keswick Jencks, the founder of the Maggie’s Cancer Caring Centres, where I proudly work.
The landform that greets you as you enter the sculpture park and gallery, Jupiter Artland, Scotland.
The visitor-accessible side of Bonnington House, adjacent to Jupiter Artland entrance. Hidden sculptures, a dovecot and more.
My daughter Rachel lying on the landform taking a pic of me taking a pic of her. I am one grassy tier above. Jupiter Artland, Scotland. Just outside of Edinburgh.
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I hate that oncologists STILL don’t know about the healthy benefits of soy for breast cancer patients. Yes I eat miso and tempeh all the time, but I make sure they are organic. Including miso in your diet actually CUTS breast cancer rates by up to 50% whether you’ve had breast cancer or not. I really wish oncologists would get on board with this……they could care less that their patients are eating processed cancer promoting crappy frozen dinners and the like which are loaded with soy protein isolate (which does affect hormones), but they have to make it a point to tell them NO “soy”??? They don’t even know what soy is!
I actually had a woman tell me she couldn’t use the lip balm I made because it had soy bean oil in it and her oncologist told her to stay away from soy….even soybean oil which has NO PROTEIN in it(the potential “hormone” component).
Anyway, I feel better getting that out. Thanks Kellie for another scrumptious dish! I’m always looking for a good marinade. I love Tempeh in my salads or in a wrap!
I try to stick to organic miso, tofu, tempeh and edamame if I eat soy! Otherwise, I say LOAD UP on the organic and non-GMO forms of them! I’ve only had amazing experiences with it. Anyways, I totally had to Pin this recipe because it looks so delicious and way too easy!
It looks so elaborate and so beautiful! I just chop it up and stir fry with whatever veggies are on hand and some spices, throw the whole thing on top of quinoa, and call it a pilaf. Go argue that it isn’t!
Never tried tempeh….now I want to….
Well, adding this one to the list too, to make once we’re resettled. I’m so glad you wrote about the benefits of tempeh and quality soy. Really good post Kellie.
Lovely, I can just imagine this. I havent had tempeh before so thanks yet again for the new experience 🙂
I’m already a believer, I love tempeh and this version looks delicious! It took my husband awhile to come on board the tempeh train, but now he enjoys it too. Marinating it is definitely the key to making it flavorful and delicious. And of course I love that it’s so healthy, one of the few high protein sources that also packs a punch of fiber, what’s not to love 🙂
I think I am going to have to make these soon, they look amazing!
Thank you 🙂