Latin Baked Tofu with Dirty Red Beans and Rice

Tonight I cooked two new dishes.  I made Latin Baked Tofu from Cadry's Kitchen.  I believe the recipe is actually from Viva Vegan with a few modifications.  I made it exactly as the recipe appears on Cadry's Kitchen, but I used a different beer and hot sauce. I also made Dirty Red Beans and Rice from 500 Vegan Recipes.  OK, I didn't have any red beans.  I could have sworn I had a can of them, but alas, I did not.  So, I used pinto beans.  I also used a brown rice mixture instead of long grain white rice.  I rarely eat white rice and I don't keep it in the house.

I baked the tofu for 20 minutes in olive oil and soy sauce.  I have used lower sodium soy sauce for years, so I don't notice any difference in flavor.  After the initial 20 minutes, I flipped the tofu and poured the marinade over it.  My pan was way too big for this as I didn't end up with any sauce by the time the baking was done.  However, the tofu still had a nice flavor.

While the tofu was baking for the final half hour, I started making the Dirty Red Beans and Rice.  I sauteed the onion, green pepper, and celery. While the trinity was sauteing, I put the rice, beans, water, soy, and a low sodium vegetable bouillon cube in the rice cooker.  

After the trinity was done cooking, I added it to the rice cooker with the rice and beans. 

 All I had to do at this point was close the lid to the rice cooker and press "cook" and let it do its thing.  I love the rice cooker.  It makes cooking rice dishes a no brainer for me and frees me up to concentrate on other aspects of the meal.

About 40 minutes later, the rice was done.  Since I used a mixture of brown rices, it took longer to cook, but I like the extra nutrition I get from using brown rice.  The tofu had finished baking and was in the oven keeping warm, so as soon as the rice was done, I was ready to dish it up and eat.

The finishing touch for me was to add a splash of Louisiana Hot Sauce on the rice.  It was the hot sauce brand I used for the Latin Baked Tofu, so I thought it would complement the meal and it did.  I didn't use it on the tofu, but it was heaven on the rice.

I'll definitely make this again.  It was an easy to make meal that didn't have a foot-long list of ingredients.  It was nice for a Saturday evening meal.  I'm thinking I can just add some vegan sausage to the rice and make some cornbread or other fresh bread and it would be a fantastic meal all by itself.