Super Easy Tempeh - Sourcing Protein Without Bloodshed 🤣

Hi everyone!

It has been a while since I last posted a food experiment post and today, I can present to you, a successful experiment making tempeh / tempe for the first time!

Tempeh / Tempe, has been a very much well loved condiment for economy rice for folks in Malaysia, and apparently it was originated from Indonesia.

Every time I get a chance to have economy rice, vegetarian stalls / Malay stalls would definitely make this, glazed with sugar and sambal.

Thanks to one of my favourite YouTube Channel, iChang, who apparently struggled to get the tempeh done correctly, prompted me to try it in a different way after reading a lot of the comments from fellow subscribers:

Instead of deep frying it, I tried using the air fryer and see if I can turn it into a healthy snack!

But wait... what is Tempeh?

For those who doesn't know what this is, this is actually a fermented soy product that cannot be kept long as the fermentation would have gone so far that it will be bad for consumption.

Apparently, according to healthline, the acidity of the soy in the tempeh is already broken down by microorganisms, so this is actually a lot healthier and friendly for gout patients compared to meat.

With that in mind I will definitely try other ways to make the tempeh less bitter and friendly for my parents to consume!

The Recipe:

Making the tempeh is actually quite straight forward. It requires 3 ingredients + water: which is turmeric, corn starch and (Himalayan) salt. I love Himalayan salt for its natural ingredients and not so salty, plus it is not bleached and processed further like table salt which is very bad for health.

(When you live with health challenging elderly, you will tend to do more research in what ingredients you use for cooking)

Not to mention that Turmeric actually has an anti inflammatory ability and for me who has been challenged greatly for my knees ever since I started the #chloetingchallenge , this snack is perfect for me too!

The Soaking

Mix the 3 ingredients with just enough water after you cut the Tempeh into thin strips, and let it soak for at least 15 minutes.

After that, drain the tempeh slices on a sift and let it dry a little.

The Oil Marinating

Then drizzle some vegetable oil and marinate it for another 1 - 2 minutes. I have tried adding onion powder on a smaller batch while coat and glaze it with oil seems to give that fragrant crisp to it after air frying.

The Frying

Depending on the size of your air fryer, the temperature could differ. Mine is the smallest capacity which requires 160 deg C (320 F) for 10 minutes when the fryer is cooled, but around 8-9 minutes when the air fryer is already running hot on a previous batch.

I actually arranged it nicely so that they are all well cooked; that is why I had to do a few batches instead of one big batch.

Tip: You can take it out to stir it and check at the tempeh chips after the first 5 minutes, to determine how your air fryer is cooking them.

Once they are done, you can set them to cool aside before keeping them as ingredients to make Sambal Tempeh later, or you can have them a little crunch.

I find eating with Mayonnaise Cayenne Pepper with Soy Sauce Dip is pretty nice too. It tastes a lot like potato fries, except, these babies are packed with protein instead of starch.

So if you are on a "clean diet" and would love to snack a little, this will work.

Baking might work too, but I didn't test that.

The best difference from the traditional tempeh is that it is not deep fried and it is a lot less oily.

Taken from Rasa.my

Usually you will see these at Malay stores, and even for vegetarians they love to glaze these with sugar sauce and curry leaf.

(Which I think I might try it with Monk Fruit Sugar)

Isn't this simple?

How about you?

Would you give this a try and see whether you like this, or are you already a tempeh fryer expert?