Salad 2.0

Here is another salad that I've got say is TDF. If you like thai flavors, you'll love this. I've had this recipe for a while but it just so happened that I found myself with a savoy cabbage and some leftover chicken. I was looking through my recipes for something to do with them and this looked like just the thing. Luckily I have a great market two blocks down so I could easily obtain mint and cilantro and the other veggies needed.

The Vietnamese Chicken Salad is traditionally served this way, as sort of a stunning composed salad. The dressed chicken goes in the center and you make neat piles of the different vegetables all around and garnish with peanuts and fresh herbs. You place the platter on the table and then toss everything together.

Dear husband was a little unsure of a cabbage salad for dinner but he came around. And that is because the dressing for this salad is so perfectly balanced. Sometimes with Thai and Vietnamese dishes, the fish sauce can be a little strong. Here it is aromatically present but not in your face. There's lime juice and chile paste with garlic, sugar and other flavors that balance it out beautifully. You could toss this with some lawn clippings and I would eat it. It is truly memorable.

*Originally posted by Mean Chef from the Cooks Talk forum

"Here is my version of a Vietnamese chicken salad. It is light, peppy and very refreshing. You can adjust quantities and types of vegetables as you like. Just keep the dressing, cabbage, cilantro and mint. "

VIETNAMESE CHICKEN SALAD

Serving Size: 4

4 bone in chicken breast half breasts
1 tbsp Lee Kum Kee Chili Garlic Sauce (or other chile paste)
1 clove garlic -- minced
3 tbsps sugar
2 tbsps rice-wine vinegar
6 tbsps freshly squeezed lime juice
4 tbsps fish sauce
6 tbsps peanut oil
1 large head savoy cabbage -- shredded or chiffonade
1/2 cup fresh mint leaves -- finely chopped
1/2 cup fresh cilantro leaves -- finely chopped
1 small red onion -- thinly sliced lengthwise
1 small fresh red or green hot chile pepper -- diced
1/2 seedless cucumber -- julienned
2 large carrots -- julienned
1 red bell pepper -- julienned
1/2 c roughly chopped roasted peanuts

1. Salt, pepper and roast chicken breasts at 400 until done. Cool.

2. Make the dressing: In a small bowl, whisk together chile paste, garlic, sugar, vinegar, lime juice, fish sauce, and peanut oil until well combined. Set aside.

3. Remove chicken meat from bones and slice each breast thinly on the bias.

4. In a medium bowl, toss together cabbage, mint, and cilantro. Add 1/2 of the dressing and toss. Place on a large platter or 4 individual platters. Top cabbage mixture with onion, pepper, cucumber, carrots, bell pepper, and chicken. Drizzle with the reserved dressing, garnish with peanuts and cilantro sprigs, and serve.
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In addition to the ingredients called for, I added some blanched and shocked snow pea pods that I julienned. (those are the dark green veg. in the picture) The only negative to this salad is the prep. There is quite a bit of julienne-ing. But hey! Look at it as an opportunity to hone your knife skills - pun intended.

You'll have leftover dressing. I've found a great thing to do with it is to toss it with broccoli slaw that can be bought in a package at a regular supermarket. This stuff is great. It has 25 calories per 3 oz. serving and tons of fiber. I like to use it to add to my regular salads, but if you toss it with this dressing and some cilantro you can make a simple, tasty salad in a flash. Here I used it as a side to an spicy orange salmon dish. I added some red pepper and garnished with peanuts.

Crispy Orange-glazed Salmon with vietnamese-flavored broccoli slaw.

The sweetness of orange juice tempers the heat of the chile pepper and red pepper flakes in this Thai-inspired dish, but it still has quite a kick. Prep: 15 minutes; Stand: 30 minutes; Cook: 9 minutes.

2/3 cup orange juice
3 tablespoons rice wine vinegar
2 tablespoons lite soy sauce
1 small red Thai chile pepper, thinly sliced
1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
1 (1-inch) piece fresh ginger, grated
4 (4- to 6-ounce) salmon fillets
2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
Salt, to taste
Freshly ground pepper, to taste
2 tablespoons honey
Hot cooked rice
Garnishes: sprouts, fresh cilantro, carrot and pepper strips, and edamame*

1. Stir together first 6 ingredients in a glass baking dish or shallow bowl. Add salmon, and drizzle with 1 tablespoon olive oil, turning to coat evenly. Marinate at least 30 minutes. Remove salmon, reserving marinade, and season with salt and pepper.
2. Heat a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat, and add remaining 1 tablespoon olive oil. Cook salmon 3 to 4 minutes per side or until fish begins to flake with fork; remove from pan. Pour reserved marinade into skillet, and add honey. Heat about 3 minutes or until syrupy. Serve salmon warm over a mound of rice, topped with sauce. Garnish, if desired.
*Edamame is available in the freezer section of most supermarkets.

Yield: Makes 4 servings

Cottage Living, MARCH 2007

Salad of the month

I think I've made this salad four times since the beginning of the year. I found it on a nifty food blog called Under the High Chair. She calls it Winter Salad of Russet Apple, Pomegranate and Pecans. A fancy name, but it is just a simple combination of apple, celery, pomegranate, shallot and pecans with an apple cider vinegar vinaigrette. I just love it and I want to call it Waldorf Salad Nouveau. For a few days last week I couldn't find a pomegranate at any market. I learned that pomegranate season runs from September to January. And I feared that my salad days were over. But, ever diligent, I kept going to different markets until I found some and then I bought a bunch to hold me over for a while.

The recipe calls for juicing the pomegranate and then reducing the juice to a syrup for drizzling over the salad. I cheat on this step by buying Pom juice and reducing that (much less messy than juicing a pomegranate.) The blog writer calls it her "play-date" salad because she makes it for moms when they meet for playdates. So for the first time, I made it with some girlfriends during a little lunch "play-date." It went over well. You can also put it this salad over greens (like baby spinach or romaine) to make it more substantial. But I like it best just as a composed little course of a salad.

The salad is simple elegance defined. S make it while you can. Also if it is still possible to get pomegranates near Valentine's Day, I could not imagine a more appropriately gorgeous first course to a romantic dinner for two.

Winter Salad of Russet Apple, Pomegranate, and Pecans - from Under the High Chair

1 russet apple, julienne
1 pomegranate, seeds removed
1 stalk firm celery, julienne
¼ cup pecans, lightly toasted and roughly chopped
1 shallot, julienne
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
2 tablespoons grape seed oil
Salt and pepper

In a very small saucepan, bring apple cider vinegar to a boil. Pour over julienne shallots and allow to cool to room temperature. Mix in grape seed oil and set aside.
Reserve about ¼ cup of the pomegranate seeds and crush the rest to extract the juice. Pour off the juice into a wide, shallow bowl and place in microwave. Microwave on high for three minutes, then scrape down sides with a spatula a stir slightly. Juice will be reducing and thickening. Microwave, one minute at a time, checking consistency between each minute until juice is consistency of maple syrup. Cool.

In a bowl, toss together the apple, reserved pomegranate seeds, celery, and shallots and some of the apple cider marinade. Season with salt and pepper and add more vinaigrette if needed. Add pecans, toss and mound onto a plate. Drizzle with pomegranate reduction and serve.

Spicy Orange Shrimp

A fiery orange sauce is great on a stir-fry, especially with shrimp. My favorite recipe is adapted from a Fine Cooking (#58) article on stir-frying. The only thing I changed was to add a large dollop of chile paste with garlic to make it a little hot. And also, to make the orange more orangey, I love to add a whopping tablespoon of this orange sauce from Trader Joe's. I use this instead of orange zest. It really brings a great flavor to the sauce.

For the stir-fry above, I used bok choy and shiitake mushrooms. It really could have used some red bell pepper. I like those with the orange flavors. But of course you can use any veggies you want. The article on stir-fries is long and I can't type out the whole thing. But I'm including the sauce recipe in case you want to try it in your own stir-fry efforts. I was also thinking you could add actual thin sliced oranges to the stir-fry. They would take on a candied flavor with the glazey orange sauce and the heat. I might have to try that.

=For the sauce recipe below: In a measuring cup, combine the cornstarch with the second ingredient in the list, whisking to blend. Then whisk in the remaining ingredients.

Cantonese Orange Sauce (yields ½ cup)

1 ½ teaspoons cornstarch
2 teaspoons soy sauce
¼ cup chicken broth
2 tablespoons thawed orange juice concentrate
2 tablespoons dry sherry
1 ½ teaspoons oyster sauce
1 teaspoon granulated sugar
½ teaspoon minced fresh ginger
1 tablespoon chile paste with garlic (optional)
Orange zest, grated (optional) or some Trader Joes Mandarin Orange sauce

The Fish Taco

I think this is my third go 'round with the fish taco. The past two times haven't been bad but I have thought of things that I could do better. This time I was really happy with the outcome. the taste came pretty close to Baja Fresh's, a fish taco we really like. I think I really nailed the sauce and I'm not going to mess with it anymore. I used a 50/50 mix of sour cream and plain non-fat yogurt. (1/4c each) I've used mayo in the past. If you google fish tacos, you'll likely see mayo called for in most recipes. But yogurt seems to provide the tang that I'm looking for and a thinner quality that mimics Baja's sauce. Then you need a healthy dose of fresh squeezed lime (a half, juiced) and some chile to your taste. I used a minced red jalapeno and a little of the adobo sauce from a can of chipotles. But the key ingredient gleamed this time was a couple teaspoons of cider vinegar. That's what brought it close to my ideal flavor, which is really tangy. For the fish itself, I used Mahi Mahi which I cut into strips and seasoned with Penzey's adobo spice blend. You could probably just make your own spice mix, but this was an easy way for me. I prefer a "grilled" fish taco as opposed to a fried one. The fried are great, no doubt about it, but this is home cooking we're talking about here. I cooked the fish strips in a non-stick saute pan, browning on both sides and cooking through. Then I kept them warm in a pre-warmed bowl covered with foil while I heated the tortillas. The other key ingredient to a great fish taco is shredded cabbage. We've tried napa, savoy, and plain old green cabbage. And it is the plain old that pleases us most, very thinly sliced. I think it is the cabbage that makes you yearn for a tanginess in the sour cream. It sort of gives you a slaw effect on the taco. Baja Fresh also serves some pico de gallo on the top of theirs. Since it is December in Chicago and fresh tomatoes aren't very good, I used some tomatillo salsa, homemade, for a fresh, hot opposition to the creamy, zingy sauce. We like corn tortillas for our fish tacos. But googling will give you many recipes using flour, so use what you like.