International Salad of Intrigue and Mystery

Yesterday we took Río to see the Bay and enjoy the Ferry Building. We were in luck: it was market day and the good folks from Volcano Kimchi were selling! I bought several of their products, and used two – the kimchi and the fermented burdock “noodles” – in this successful salad.

2 cups baby spinach
1/2 avocado, cubed
1/2 mango (ripe or unripe), cubed
big handful of minced green onion
150 gr tofu, extra firm, flavored or unflavored
1 large or 2 small zucchini, cut into thin matchsticks
1 package fermented burdock “noodles”
100 gr soba noodles, cooked according to instructions and rinsed in cold water
1/2 cup kimchi of any kind
splash of soy sauce

Mix all ingredients and devour!

Fresh Salad with Green Beans, Chickpeas, and Macadamia Cheeses

This salad turned out wonderful thanks to its high-quality components: mixed supergreens, pea shoots, cucumber, radish, chickpeas, lightly steamed green beans, and some of the macadamia cheese from a few days ago. Simply dressed with a few drops of balsamic vinegar, it tasted like something you’d expect to find at a French bistro.

Enjoy!

Kale, Squash and Lima Salad with Amazing Green Dressing

After seeing a vegan Green Goddess dressing recipe on the Oh She Glows blog, I was determined to make something fantastic to put it on. I didn’t have all the ingredients for the dressing on hand, so I substituted ingredients from our backyard. It came out lovely! You’ll have a lot of leftover dressing, which you can have on other salads, grains, beans… it’s so delicious it makes anything into a feast.

For the salad:
1 large bunch dino kale
1/2 large, or 1 small, butternut squash, cubed
2 cups cooked (or canned) large white lima beans

For the dressing:
2 cloves garlic
2 ripe avocados
juice from 4 lemons
1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1/2 cup fresh parsley
1 big handful green onions
1 big handful fresh oregano
1 big handful mint or catnip
water to taste

Place all ingredients for the dressing in food processor and process until smooth. Add water until it reaches desired consistency (pourable but viscous).

Remove stems from kale leaves and massage leaves in a large bowl. Add a few spoonfuls of the dressing and mix well to coat. Add squash and beans and lightly toss. Enjoy!

Crunchy Salad of Beauty

Look at this salad! There’s a little bit of everything: crunchiness, tartness, nice colors. It’s crunchy and happy. It’s very easy to make, and comes out especially pretty if you have a spiralizer.

1 small cabbage or 1/3 big one, roughly chopped (wider ribbons than you’d make for slaw)
1 big rainbow radish or several small ones, thinly sliced or spiralized
1 small cucumber, thinly sliced or spiralized
1 small orange, sectioned and cut into bite-size slices
juice from 2 lemons
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp mustard seeds

Mix and enjoy!

Sudan: Salaat Jazar

Continuing our banned countries cooking extravaganza, I present a delicious Sudanese salad, salaat jazar. It’s a great illustration of the principle that the whole is bigger than its parts and is refreshing, tasty, and very nutritious.

1 pound carrots (I used rainbow carrots)
juice from 4-5 lemons
4 large garlic cloves, pressed
1 tbsp ground sumac
1/2 tsp olive oil
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground paprika
1 tsp  ground coriander
1 small handful fresh cilantro

Slice carrots and steam them for a few minutes, until just cooked and still al dente.

Mix all other ingredients except the cilantro.

Place sliced, steamed carrots in bowl, and pour dressing over them. Mix well. Then, sprinkle fresh cilantro.

Chickpea “UnTuna” Salad

I like deli meals and Salade Niçoise – as evidenced by this post! But the ready-made “vegan Toona” we used did not hit the spot. It was very oily, salty, and oddly textured. Give it a try; you might like it better than me. But I found a homemade solution that is very tasty and satisfying. It’s a recipe adapted from Sweet Potato Soul, with a few modifications. We didn’t have umeboshi vinegar, but we did have my friend Nancy’s quince-infused vinegar, which is fantastic. I also decided to add some nori to the recipe for a more “fishy” taste. The result was delicious!

2 cups of cooked chickpeas
1/2 small avocado
1 tbsp dijon mustard
2 tbsp vinegar (we used quince, and I bet apple cider would be nice, too)
1 celery stalk, chopped
2 tsp celery seeds
2 tbsp minced green onion
1 tsp chili flakes
2 sheets of nori, torn into squares

Place everything in the food processor and pulse just a few seconds, until everything is mixed and the texture is to your taste. YUM!

Vegan Salade Niçoise

It’s been a month of bad news on every possible level: personal losses, professional disappointments, you name it. To keep our spirits up, we’re trying to eat healthy and well, and today I was inspired to put a little French elegance into our dinner with this simple version of a salade niçoise. The components of this nice composed salad are easy to make and a breeze to assemble.

I’m not particularly in love with the pre-made fake tuna product we used, Vegan Toona, and next time I make this recipe I’ll make a chickpea substitute from scratch (this recipe looks intriguing.) But let’s discuss the different components.

Ready-made stuff you’ll need include cherry tomatoes (colorful ones are especially fun,) Persian cucumbers, tiny radishes, and good olives (not the nasty canned stuff.)

You’ll also need tiny waxy potatoes–we used red and purple–which you can bake for about 20 mins. at 350 degrees, and green beans, which you’ll steam or pressure-cook (I do it for 1 minute in the Instant Pot on high pressure) and, when still crunchy, drop immediately into ice water.

Another component is my beloved tofu eggless salad, which I made this time with olives in lieu of pickles, lots of green onion and parsley, and some kala namak salt for extra egginess.

And finally, Toona is sorta good if drenched in fresh lemon juice and mixed with some thinly minced green onions.

After organizing all the components on the plate, drizzle them with olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and Herbs de Provence.

Kelp Noodle Salad

Kelp noodles are so nice to work with! I’ve posted a couple of recipes that include them here and here, but I think this salad is really wonderful. It’s a really nice dinner on a hot day–light and zesty.

1 package kelp noodles
1 large carrot
2 large zucchini
1 package collard greens
1 tsp olive oil
1 tsp lemon juice
2 tsp white wine/whiskey
3 tbsp soy sauce or liquid aminos
1 tbsp salsa
1 tsp chopped garlic
1 tsp chopped ginger
1/2 package extra-firm tofu
2 tbsp raw tahini

There are three steps here, and each of them could produce a separate dish.

Collard Greens

Chop coarsely and sauté in olive oil. When soft, add booze and lemon juice and sauté for another couple of minutes.

Baked Tofu

Heat up the oven to 350 Fahrenheit. Make the marinade with salsa, garlic, ginger, soy sauce, and some water, make cubes out of the tofu, and let them rest in the marinade for half an hour. Then, bake the tofus. Save the marinade.

Assembling the salad

Get kelp noodles out of package and wash with water. Place in big salad bowl. Thinly slice or spiralize carrots and zucchini, and add. Mix tahini with marinade to produce a dressing, pour over noodles and veg and stir well. Add collard greens and tofu cubes and stir again, until just combined. Serve at room temperature.