INFO Thursdays: Tempeh Beats Bread...the Stuff of Strife

The food blogosphere, and indeed, the entire web is replete with meat-substitute articles, mostly featuring tofu. That's not me. This blog is NOT meatless, just sugarless, breadless, and pastaless. (interesting note: Google, which owns Blogger, registers the first two words--meatless, sugarless--as accepted, but underscores the last two as incorrect--needless to say they are 'added to dictionary').

Therefore, I'm always on the lookout for bread substitutes (sugar seems well taken care of by honey, agave and stevia, among many alternatives).  As someone who was probably always pretty hyper-glycemic, bread loaves, croutons, bread-crumbs and the like are avoided. Fortunately, vegan and vegetarian food-substitutes for meat also, often, work well as bread, breading or bread-crumb alternatives.

I'm talking, of course, chiefly about tempeh...but also about items like almond meal and various non-glutinous flours: pure buckwheat and Amaranth come to mind. Flax meal, too. Tempeh is not as well known as that other big substitute, tofu, which is a little odd, given that tempeh is more flavorful than tofu. It's made from fermented soybean, and other grains (a maddening amount of web tempeh descriptions describe it as a 'soybean-only' product, which is simply NOT true). And, with meaty consistency, is often used to conjure that food item. Trader Joe's sells a brand that incorporates soy, barley, rice and millet.

I crumble up tempeh, in place of rice or bread-crumbs, but--and this is important--mostly for savory dishes, not for sweet dishes. In this sense, tofu is the more versatile food-substitute. Tempeh, meanwhile, while being a source of protein much like tofu, also contains B vitamins. There is a frightening paucity of tempeh data, information, recipes and, frankly, product, both on and off the web. (Note to U.S. grain farmers: possible big money in growing tempeh components, and making tempeh starter).

As we progress, I'll be seeking out more recipes that include tempeh--much as my vegetarian chili did from last week. I welcome tempeh links and submissions.