Step 1

Press the tofu for about two hours. I do this by wrapping the tofu in a non-fluffy tea towel and then putting it on a plate (to catch the liquid). I press with my heavy butcher block cutting board, with my cast iron dutch oven on top of it as a weight.

Step 2

The tofu needs to be fermented in an airtight container that is just slightly larger than the tofu. See the notes for some suggestions.

Step 3

Mix the miso, vinegar, and sugar in the fermentation container. Coat the tofu in miso paste. The whole block needs to be coated in miso to ferment properly. You can cut the tofu to make it all fit in the container, but I recommend leaving it whole, if possible because it’s easier to scrape the miso off of a single block of tofu.

Step 4

Put the lid on the container and write the date on a sticky note (so you don’t forget)! Stash it in the back of the fridge for at least 1 week and up to 3 months. It packs quite a bit of flavor so I usually just use a little bit at a time and leave the rest to keep fermenting.

Step 5

You may get a bit of white mold forming on the surface of the miso. That’s just the koji mold. Feel free to scrape it off and keep fermenting.