Mapo Tofu (Spicy Tofu and Pork)

When I make my gluten-free version of mapo tofu for friends and family, I tell them it's Chinese chili!

A nice spicy bowl of mapo tofu.

Mapo tofu is a common menu item at Chinese restaurants. It is a spicy, saucy dish made with tofu and ground pork—and unfortunately, it’s almost certainly not gluten free. Two of the ingredients that would be used in a restaurant, chili bean paste (doubanjiang) and soy sauce, are almost guaranteed to contain gluten. GF versions of both exist, but they are more expensive than the standard versions made with wheat, so the average restaurant is unlikely to use them.

So that’s why if you want to enjoy mapo tofu, you’ll want to make it at home using only GF ingredients.

I had a pleasant surprise when I was researching this recipe. For years, I’ve assumed there was no such thing as gluten-free chili bean paste, so I’ve always used a workaround that involved substituting Chinese preserved black beans and hot sauce for the doubanjiang when making mapo tofu. When I made mapo tofu for family members who were unfamiliar with it, I told them to think of it as Chinese chili!

The substitutes worked well, and I was actually preparing to write about that method. But as I was preparing to cook my most recent batch of mapo tofu, I did a search online, and I found it—a GF chili bean paste! The brand I found is Youki (search for “Youki doubanjiang” for the best results). It imported from Japan, and its label doesn’t list wheat as an ingredient (the label doesn’t specifically state that it is gluten free, but other brands of doubanjiang list wheat as an ingredient). So now, thanks to Youki brand doubanjiang, I can tell you the traditional way of making mapo tofu, as taught to me be the talented Mr. Yin (though using GF versions of the ingredients he used), who, as I mentioned in my GF Chinese dumpling wrapper recipe, was formerly a cook in China.

(If you’re curious about my workaround method, it was to replace the chili bean paste with ¼ cup preserved black beans [search online for “yang jiang preserved black beans”] and hot sauce to taste.)

My prize find! Youki doubanjiang, made without wheat!

Ingredients:

• 3 tablespoons neutral-tasting oil

• 3 cloves of garlic, chopped (about 2 tablespoons)

• 1 tablespoon gluten-free chili bean paste (doubanjiang)

• 5 tablespoons chopped scallions

• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh ginger

• 1 cup ground pork (about ½ pound)

• 1 tablespoon gluten-free soy sauce or tamari

• ½ cup water at room temperature

• A 1-pound block of firm tofu, sliced into half-inch cubes

Directions:

• At medium-high heat, warm the oil in a pan (I usually use a cast iron fry pan for this)

• Add the garlic and stir it for a few seconds to release the fragrance

• Add the chili bean paste to the pan and mix it with the garlic

• Add 2 tablespoons of the chopped scallions (save the rest of the scallions for later) and the 2 tablespoons of chopped ginger to the pan

• Cook all of the seasonings together, stirring to blend, for about a minute

• Add the ground pork and stir to break it up as it cooks

• When the pork is cooked through and broken into tiny pieces, add the GF soy sauce and water and bring it to a boil

• Add the tofu, stir to coat it with all of the seasonings, then cover and turn the heat down to medium

• Cook for about 10 minutes, then stir in the remaining 3 tablespoons of scallions and remove from the heat

• Serve the mapo tofu with rice (a vegetable that goes nicely with this is fresh spinach sauteed with garlic)

You’ll need scallions, GF soy sauce, GF chili bean paste, ginger, garlic, ground pork, and firm tofu.

After briefly cooking the seasonings, add the ground pork.

Once the pork is cooked and broken into small pieces, add the tofu—it’s nearly done!

Gluten-free deliciousness!