Simple Salad with Maple Balsamic Tofu

I don't eat a lot of salad. It was the first thing I got sick of when I went vegan, but I have been craving salads more often lately so I am bringing them back into the rotation. There is nothing too fancy about this particular salad, just veggies, seeds and a dressing I put together last week with ingredients we had on hand. Thus the accompanying tofu had to be a little special. I didn't include the dressing recipe here because I didn't measure anything exactly and it was a week ago so my memory is foggy. I will have a future post on how to throw together salad dressings.







Ingredients:

Salad 
-lettuce
-tomato
-pepper
-celery
-cucumber
-sunflower and hemp seeds

Maple Balsamic Tofu
-1 tbsp olive oil
-420 g (one package) firm tofu cut into 6 slices
-2 tbsp maple syrup
-1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
-salt and pepper
-salad dressing of choice (Greek works well)

Directions:
1. Chop salad veggies and combine in a bowl. Quantity is not important with salad veggies, chop as much as you like. Sprinkle sunflower and hemp seeds over top and set aside.
2. Add olive oil to a pan and heat on medium. Before the pan gets too hot, arrange the tofu slices on the pan so there is no space between then (pictured above).
3, When the oil starts to bubble pour the maple syrup and balsamic vinegar over the tofu. Keep a lid to the pan handy during the pour in case there is splatter when the syrup and vinegar mix with the hot oil.
4. Cover the pan and left the tofu cook until the bottom begins to brown. Then flip to brown the other side. The maple syrup should caramelize a little. When both sides have browned a bit, add salt and pepper to taste.
5. Add salad and tofu to a plate. Add favorite dressing to the salad and enjoy.