by Jon Cloud

Twenty-one years ago I embarked on an enterprise which I thought would enhance my organic farm income. With the boundless enthusiasm of an individual who has just discovered sliced bread, I began to study and train in the art/science of soy milk and tofu production. Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.;

One year later, after working in a classic labor-intensive Japanese one-kettle soy milk and tofu shop, I was ready to begin experimenting at the farm with kitchen-sized batch production. Determined to find a cost-effective method for home and cottage industry production of soy milk and tofu, I began to talk with anyone who knew anything about home production. I should add that my co-workers at the tofu shop thought I was crazy in attempting to develop a home production method which would compete with the high quality soy milk they were producing. Time would prove my co-workers right. I was crazy.

For those who are as possessed with the concept of home soy milk production as I was, I offer some pointers.

First, buy The Book of Tofu by William Shurtleff & Akiko Aoyagi (1975). The book was originally published by Random House and should be available at local bookstores. Once you have purchased the book, read it. Then begin to assemble the following items:

• 2.5-5 gallon bucket

• thermometer

• cold water

• grinder (sausage or flour mill is best; a home blender can be used but is very slow)

• heavy gauge 8-10 gallon cooking pot

• 1 or 2 10-12 quart pots

• hand sieve

• insulated gloves

• large ladle

• package of wide cheese cloth

• 6 ft x 6 ft square of nylon or poly sheer (white curtain material: 45 strands per inch)

• clean containers for storing the soy milk (mason jars with lids are ideal)

Weigh out 2.5 lb. of dried tofu-type soybeans. (Do not use general purpose soybeans as these are the oil type and are low in protein. They will make a low quality soy milk and cannot make tofu.) Place them in your bucket and fill with 60° F. water. Let the soybeans soak for 12-14 hours, changing the water three times. At the end of the soaking period, split a soybean in half. If you see a uniform yellow-cream color across the inside of the bean, drain the water out of the bucket. If the center is a darker color and slightly harder, continue to soak until the uniform color is achieved.

Take the soaked soybeans and begin grinding them. You may need to add some cold water during grinding to assist the development of as fine a particle size as possible. Grinding physically breaks the protein cells and releases the soluble proteins during cooking. The finer the grind, the more protein. Do not use hot water as the soybean contains a trypsin inhibitor which prevents the absorption of proteins in the digestive system. If the trypsin inhibitor is not activated during grinding, it will be much easier to eliminate during cooking. All of the ground soybeans (called gô) should be put into the 10-12 quart pot and placed next to the stove.

Fill the heavy-gauge cooking pot 1/3 with water and bring it to a rolling boil. Add the ground soybeans to the cooking pot in four parts. This ensures that the cooking material does not cool down and end up sticking to the sides of the kettle. (You may need to add smaller quantities of the ground soybeans if you are cooking on a smaller stove or using only one burner of your stove.) When the last of the ground soybeans have been added and the pot has returned to a boil, continue cooking for another 16 minutes to deactivate the trypsin inhibitor. During the cooking process you will need to skim the impurities and soybean hulls from the soy milk with a sieve. During the last phase of cooking, you can add small quantities of cold water to the cooking pot to prevent it from boiling over. Once the 16 minutes of final cooking is complete, remove the cooking kettle from the heat use insulated gloves.

Slowly pour the cooked material into your clean 10-12 quart pot(s) which have been lined first with a double or triple layer of cheese cloth.

The quantity of cooked material will have a direct relationship with the amount of cold water you added during the cooking and grinding stages. The more water you add, the more dilute your protein content in the finished product. The less water you add, the less finished product you have. These are personal preference issues.

Once all the cooked material has been poured into the pots you can begin the straining process. Gather the corners and edges of the cheese cloth together and slowly lift the cloth out of the pot. Spin the cloth slowly so the soybean particles are concentrated in the center of the cloth; this allows you to wring more soy milk out of the particles trapped in the cloth. (These soybean particles – okara – still contain 50% of the protein of the soybean and can be used in loaf dishes or fed to animals as a protein source.)

Now the final stage of processing is at hand. Clean your cooking kettle and line it with the nylon or poly sheer curtain material. Pour all your soy milk back in the kettle and use the curtain material to remove the tiny soybean particles the same way you used the cheese cloth to remove the large soybean particles. You now have soy milk. It should still be very hot and ready to bottle.

Use your ladle to fill your heated glass canning jars. Be sure the jars are standing in your canning pot and have been warmed sufficiently to prevent cracking when the hot soy milk is ladled into them. These liquids are boiling and dangerous so make sure that children and animals are kept well out of the cooking area – for your safety as well as theirs. The filled jars are ready for lidding, cooling and storage.

Good luck, and enjoy the juice of the bean.