Alton Brown Schools Me. Week 1

So I've taken it upon myself to conquer cookbooks that I've had sitting around for awhile and haven't done anything with. The first one I have is "I'm Just Here for the Food" by Alton Brown. I love Alton Brown; he's really nerdy. Not only does he tell you how to make something, and make it well, he also tells you the most random bits of knowledge about what you're doing or why you should do something a certain way. I also like that his cookbooks are separated by cooking method rather than the type of dish. It's a concept that works really well for him, because of the scientific way he looks at food. So I decided that I would try to do one recipe a week from the book, doing a different chapter each week.
The first chapter is on searing, and there are a lot of really good sounding recipes. Since we're all trying to eat a bit better and cut some of the meat out of our diet in my house, I went with 'Bar-B-Fu'. I love tofu. A lot. A lot of people at work apparently don't like it. I'm thinking that they've never had it cooked right, or they've never had it at all and just have some sort of misconception about it. When I lived down in Champaign, I wasn't a big fan of it. Most of the places that I had tofu down there only used the soft tofu, and it was always steamed. Definitely not a fan of that. I like firm tofu, and I like it pan fried, dammit. If I wanted Jello that's what I would have gotten. Fortunately, Alton Brown likes the firm stuff too. The sandwiches, just so you know, were served with a side of doom zucchini oven fries, were only mediocre. That's what I get for relying on the internet to tell me how to cook my vegetables.

Bar-B-Fu (adapted from Alton Brown)
1 19 oz package firm tofu (I get the kind that comes in 4 chunks, and then i sliced each one in half to get 8 big squares)
3 Tbsp minced garlic (I like garlic. A lot)
1 Serrano chile, seeded and minced
1/3 c. original Sweet Baby Rays (the only brand of BBQ sauce I will buy)
1/4 c. white vinegar
kosher salt & fresh ground black pepper
sub rolls
3/4 c. Goose Island 312 (out of a 22 oz. bottle, the rest of which I enjoyed while catching up on Kitchen Nightmares. I have now seen EVERY episode)

Drain your tofu and press between paper towels to absorb as much excess moisture as possible. Whilst doing that, mix the garlic, Serrano, BBQ sauce, and vinegar.

Season the tofu with salt and pepper and place in a large zup lock bag. Put the sauce in the bag and *GENTLY!!!* shake to coat the tofu. Shake too hard and it's going to look like scrambled eggs and you're going to look like a nincompoop. Let sit for an hour. Enjoy the rest of your bottle of beer. If your day was anything like mine, you earned it.

Drain the marinade from the tofu. Alton's recipe says to reserve it, but my tofu sucked the life out of it and there wasn't much left. What I did instead was take the 3/4 c. beer and a hefty amount of bbq sauce and simmered that in a hot pan, cooked it down, and had beerbeque sauce. Good enough. Heat a separate (NON-STICK) pan over high heat. DO NOT ADD OIL. Add tofu squares and cook on each side for 2 minutes, without moving the tofu around. I know you want to, but don't. AB says if you do, you're not going to brown your tofu. Heat your rolls up (room temp breads just don't do it for me), cut a slit, stick your tofu in and add sauce. Delicious.
The tofu was nice and flavorful, spicy in an enjoyable way. I do love spicy foods, but not the kind that I feel like I'm dying spicy, like the horrid noodle mess that we had the misfortune of eating last week.

And one thing to leave you with from this week's Asian food shopping adventure:

I wonder if it's anything like CHUD.