Picture this. January 2003. Winter in Chicago, my second quarter in graduate school. Living in a tiny studio, with a cruddy Internet connection. With freezing cold winter days and the husband (at that point, the fiance) in a different time zone, it is no wonder that my best friend was cable television (as seen through a 13-inch VCR/TV Combo). Winter 2003 is when I discovered the Food Network. My favorite show, the one I taped if I was at school, and watched every day, sometimes twice a day, was Food 911 with Tyler Florence. This recipe, from an episode when he was helping some housewife learn how to cook with tofu, became a staple when I was in school. This, and a chick pea/tomato/spinach curry dish over rice. Hmm. I’ll have to re-create that one at some point, too.

Panko-breaded tofu, pan-fried, served atop soba noodles in a spicy ginger soup. In this instance I used buckwheat noodles, but you get the idea. The soup is a hot and sour type of broth, made with a mixture of soy, oyster sauce, rice wine vinegar, sambal sauce and thinly sliced ginger coins.

BTW, it was in grad school that I also loved watching reruns of NYPD Blue. I watched five or more seasons of the show throughout the spring/summer (LOVED not having class until 1PM!)