Review: Nasoya Silken Creations

Nasoya contacted me awhile ago to review their new Silken Creations. I was admittedly curious about them anyway when I saw them in the store, so I jumped right on it. What could be better then easy dessert? Nothing, that's what. The first sweets attack hit a couple nights after we bought the packages, and Michael wanted to just eat the vanilla as straight up pudding. Fine with me! I wanted to see what the texture was like directly out of the package anyway. And there is truly no faster way to cure a sweets craving than 'open...eat'.

love at first bite

We grated a little fresh nutmeg onto it in order to at least have a slightly more complex flavor dimension. And it was surprisingly delicious! I do admit that at first I was a little weirded out by eating...well, basically silken tofu right out of the package. But don't be deterred! The flavor of the vanilla is right on target, and nicely sweet. The texture was like slightly runny pudding. Like when you make pudding, but can't wait for it to set up all the way, so you just eat it anyway. Don't act like you've never done it.

Next I really wanted to see how this stuff set up when baked. Naturally, a chocolate pie was in order.

heaven

Nasoya nicely puts a couple of recipes on back of all the packages, and the chocolate came with a nice basic pie recipe and a minty frozen pie recipe. We didn't want to wait for the stuff to freeze that night, but we did want a mint chocolate creation...so we combined the two. We blended the tofu with some cornstarch and mint extract, poured it in the shell (yeah, that's storebought, sue me), and baked it. Waiting for it to cool was absolute torture, but worth it. Look how well it set up:

i ate both of those

Oh, I forgot that we also added about 1/4 cup of chocolate chips to the mixture before baking. If only I'd had some soy whipped cream to go on top...alas. It was perfect as is. The chocolate flavor rules. (I've also eaten this one straight out of the package and it makes an even better pudding than the vanilla.) And you guys. This was so easy. This pie has literally 4 ingredients, and that's only because we made it complicated. If you leave out the mint extract and chocolate chips, it's even easier. So good. This pie did not last 24 hours, by the way. The chocolate was by far mine and Michael's favorite flavor.

It took me awhile to think of what I wanted to do with the strawberry. I'm not a huge fan of fruity/sweet things unless someone else is making them. They tend to be complicated with all kinds of peeling and chopping and cooking down. Granted, there was no need for that in this instance, but because of my general aversion to working hard and making fruity desserts, I had a serious lack of recipes in mind for this. Luckily, there are loads of recipes up at the Nasoya website, and their lovely PR person steered me in the right direction. I knew I'd be making this one as soon as I read the ingredients.

strawberry lemonade pops!

1 package of the strawberry tofu and 1/3 cup lemon juice. Gotcha. I also wanted to see how well it froze and how that affected the texture, so I could give a well rounded review. Guess what? It freezes really well. It does lose a bit of its creaminess, but I like the icy texture of these popsicles. I do have to say, to be fair, that the strawberry flavor was my least favorite. I think it had a bit of an artificial taste that left me wanting more... More chocolate, that is. Although maybe it would be better in something baked.

Still, I wholeheartedly say that Nasoya Silken Creations are definitely the lazy girl's guide to fast and easy desserts, without sacrificing any on flavor, especially the chocolate and vanilla. I can't wait to try more. Frozen chocolate/blueberry pops! Vanilla/peach pie! Chocolate/vanilla swirl frozen pie of greatness! And other things besides pie and frozen pops, that I will think of once my brain wakes up! So buy without fear, my friends. This stuff is good.