"While tofu isn’t technically alive, it’s close to it: The soybeans it’s made from could easily have had a second life in collaboration with fungi or bacteria as fermented soybean paste, natto, miso, or soy sauce. Perhaps that’s why tofu, even in its plainest forms, feels so imaginatively ripe for comparison to living things. The fine bubbles on tofu skin served in cold salad seem to come from a wobbling creature, while tofu pudding — soft tofu served either sweet or savoury — has won the name doufunao (豆腐脑), tofu brains, in northern China. At Café TPT, jostled up next to other customers as they pull at tender seabass and crack at crispy duck skin, it’s impossible not to see the potential for intelligent life in a wooden keg of jiggling beancurd. Café TPT is proud of its desserts — their image emblazons the restaurant’s window — and rightly so. Sweet-toothed diners should follow chef’s recommendations, and get the mango and grapefruit flavour." - Hester van Hensbergen
