Mapo tofu is a classic Sichuan dish that I remember eating as a child. I didn’t know the name of the dish, and it was only recently that my parents told me what I had eaten. They also told me that my dad made mapo tofu from a spice packet and didn’t have a recipe for me. I googled, came up with several recipes, and kind of combined them into something I could be happy with.
Ingredients: spicy soy bean paste (I didn’t know I already had broad bean paste, oops), garlic, ginger, sichuan flower peppers, chili powder, ground pork (I had some that was already cooked, but raw would work well here too), green onions, dark soy, chili oil, dry vermouth (I don’t have chinese cooking sherry) and medium firm tofu (I wish I had soft, but couldn’t find any).
1. This step was not in every recipe, but I did it and it ended up being a really important step. I dry roasted a tablespoon of flower peppers (meaning putting them into a dry pan on medium high heat, stirring, until they were fragrant). Then I ground the peppers in my mortar.
2. The ground peppers were combined with about 3 tablespoons of the chili oil and headed on medium high just until everything smelled great.
3. The pork was then added with a generous few tablespoons of the spicy bean paste and just a tad chili powder. I also added good portions of minced garlic and ginger (a good chunk of ginger and about 3 garlic cloves). I cooked this until the pork was nicely browned and the bean paste was cooked through.
4. When everything is fragrant and the meat is cooked through, Add diced tofu and just enough water to cover. Then I simmered this for a good 15 minutes.
5. Lastly, shredded green onions were added. This was mixed and just heated through.
We had it with rice, plain steamed broccoli and a lettuce and cucumber salad (with a light dressing of soy, toasted sesame seeds, sugar and sesame oil).
I will add more chili powder next time (or maybe some fresh chiles). But it was very tasty, spicy, and so yummy with the veggies. M loved it too! The toasted flower peppers really made a difference.
usheeshobbynook 
Ahhhh, my favourite!! x
I haven’t had it in years, and need to perfect the dish. But even this first attempt turned out very yummy.
This is the best meal ever since the invention of not-quite-burning food. My personal favourite! And amazingly easy to knock together. For me, it’s beef mince, and it ain’t mapo doufu without shiitake mushrooms though. But the point of the dish is to knock up a simple but tasty meal from what’s handy, so anything goes, eh? As long as it has those Sichuan peppers. Here’s another good variation: https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cookbook:Mapo_Doufu
Unfortunately, ingredients (like shiitake) are difficult to find where I live right now. But will be experimenting with adding different veggies. Also did find broad bean paste in Hamburg — yay!