From a general search on 'tofu'
done on Yahoo, turning up some interesting sites giving the history, etc.
of tofu. Nary a mention of Monsanto....no need to mention URLs,
since they all for the most part say the same thing...
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Tofu: A 2,000-year old
health food miracle
Compiled by William Shurtleff of
Soyfoods Center.
In 220 A.D. archeologists find a depiction of the preparation of
soymilk and tofu, suggesting that they were being made in northern China
during the Eastern/Later Han Period (A.D. 22-220).
In Japan, the first mention of tofu was in 1183 in the diary of
Hiroshige Nakaomi, a Shinto priest of the shrine at Nara; tofu was used as
an offering at the shrine's altar. However, it wasn't until 1489
that the current characters used today for the word "tofu" were first
written in Japan.
In 1603 "tofu" makes its first appearance in a European-language
document, Vocabuliario do lingoa de Iapam...[Vocabulary of the language
of Japan], the earliest dictionary of the Japanese language compiled
by Jesuits living in Nagasaki, Japan.
A more detailed description of tofu by a Westerner was in 1665
by Domingo Fernandez de Navarrete, in his book A Collection of Voyages
and Travels. Navarrete, who served as a Dominican missionary in China,
wrote about tofu "... the most usual, common and cheap sort of food all
China abounds in, and which all men in that empire eat, from the emperor
to the meanest Chinese..."
The earliest known reference to tofu by an American wasn't until
1770. It appears in a letter written by the famous Benjamin
Franklin in London to John Bartram in Philadelphia. He sent Bartram some
soybeans� which he called "Chinese caravances".
In the 1800s, Chinese immigrants were coming to the United
States to work and "make their fortune." The first tofu manufacturer in
America, Wo Sing & Co., was founded in 1878 in San Francisco to serve
this growing market. They were followed by Hirata & Co. (1895) in
Sacramento, California, the earliest known Japanese-American company
and Quong Hop & Co. (1896), the oldest existing tofu maker in America
today.
The two oldest existing Japanese-American tofu companies (House foods
& Yamauchi Inc. of Los Angeles and Aala Tofu Co. of Honolulu) began as
H. Iwanaga Daufu in Hawaii in 1923. In 1926 the company was
renamed Shoshiro Kanehori Tofu, and again in 1937 as Haruko Uyeda
Tofu, still at the same address. About 1939 the company was
purchased by Mr. and Mrs. Shokin Yamauchi, who later renamed it Aala Tofu
Co. Their son, Shoan Yamauchi, made tofu at the family company until
1946, when he went to Los Angeles, purchased the Hinode Tofu Co.,
and began making tofu there in 1947. After becoming Matsuda-Hinode
Tofu Co. in 1963, the company was renamed House Foods &
Yamauchi Inc. in 1983.
Tofu production was concurrently taking place on the European
continent. Although Paillieux of France, in 1880, was the first to
make tofu, Cas�o-Soja�ne, founded by Li Yu-ying, a Chinese citizen,
biologist and engineer, was the first commercial scale manufacturer.
Established in May 1911 at a site, a few miles northwest of Paris,
the company was making and selling tofu.
Back in America, non-Asians also took up the craft of tofu making. In
1929 T.A. Van Gundy, a Seventh-Day Adventist and founder of La
Sierra Industries in Arlington, California, became the first Westerner to
make tofu commercially when he introduced La Sierra Soya Cheese. This tofu
was canned and pimento was added to prevent the tofu from graying after
canning.
Even with decades of tofu production in the U.S., it wasn't until
1958 that tofu was first sold in a U.S. supermarket. Boys Market
supermarket chain� which had about 12 stores at the time in Los Angeles�
was the pioneer. Made by Matsuda Hinode Tofu Co., the tofu was sold in
individual packages.
Tofu not only became a part of the American diet, it became the subject
of books, too. The Library of Congress established in 1965 the
subject heading "Tofu" as the official name for that food in cataloging
books for libraries across America.
The Book of Tofu, by Shurtleff and Aoyagi, played a major role
in introducing tofu to the Western World. Published by Autumn Press in
1975, this book has sold about 550,000 copies to date.
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The protein from Soy is complete. It has all eight essential amino
acids. In this respect, the soy bean is no ordinary bean. It is truly a
gift from God. Ironically, the value of Soy is only partially
understood in the West. The United States grows 2/3 of the World's Soy and
squanders it's protein on animal feed. Soy has the ability to provide 30%
more protein per acre than any other crop, and 20 times the protein
derived from an acre dedicated to beef cattle.
The hybrids of Soy Beans normally grown in this country are not
suitable for making high quality Soy Milk or Tofu. A good Tofu Soybean
is nearly twice the size of the typical American Chicken Feed soybean. The
Tofu Soy Bean is higher in Protein and lower in fat that the typical
American bean.
Often when preaching about Tofu to my fellow Americans, I am asked
what Tofu tastes like and what it can be used for. I have finally come
up with a good analogy. Tofu in the Orient is like the potato in the West.
The potato can be baked, boiled, broiled, grilled, or fried. It can be
eaten whole, smashed, in cubes, mixed with a thousand other things to form
an unlimited number of dishes. Tofu is exactly the same. As for the taste
of a potato, a boiled potato with no butter or salt is a little bland. Raw
tofu actually tastes much better than a boiled potato. If you can eat
Yoghurt or Cottage Cheese, then you could eat raw tofu. There are some big
differences between Tofu and potatos though, Tofu never has black rotten
spots like potatos, or worms, or dirty peels. Also Tofu has digestable
complete protein where the potato has none.
There are two broad categories of Tofu, Firm Tofu and Soft (or
Silken) Tofu. Firm Tofu is the more versatile of the two varieties. It
is truly like the potato in it's utility. Silken Tofu is best eaten raw or
used in Soups, most notably Miso Soup. Silken Tofu does not stir fry well.
Because of it's consistency, it will not absorb the flavors of the meats
and vegetables being fried as Firm Tofu will, and also it tends to
crumble. Both Firm and Silken Tofus are available in most grocery stores
in the vegetable section. Tofu is like a dairy product in that it must be
refrigerated and has a short shelf life. It is normally sold in plastic
tubs, immersed in water. Naturally, the water should be poured off, the
tofu rinsed and patted dry before using. Silken Tofu often comes inside
foil packages from Japan. In this case, the Silken Tofu is
ultra-pasteurized and so has a very long shelf life. Firm Tofu is always
fresh.
Here is how Tofu is made in a nutshell:
