Crunchy Cashew Thai Salad with KEEN-wah

Photo and Recipe from Ambitious Kitchen

Yep it’s been a salad week! Which is funny since it wasn’t even hot out and was probably one of the last few chances I had to cook up a storm with the oven, without suffering. So naturally all I made were salads.

Crunchy Cashew Thai  Quinoa Salad with Ginger Peanut Dressing

Ingredients

• ¾ cup uncooked quinoa
• 1-2 cups shredded red cabbage, depending on how much crunch you like
• 1 red bell pepper, diced
• ½ red onion, diced
• 1 cup shredded carrots
• ½ cup chopped cilantro
• ¼ cup diced green onions
• ½ cup cashew halves or peanuts (honey-roasted is good)
• Optional: 1 cup edamame or chickpeas
• Fresh lime, for a bit of tang
• For the dressing:
• ¼ cup all natural peanut butter
• 2 teaspoons freshly grated ginger
• 3 tablespoon soy sauce, gluten-free if desired
• 1 tablespoon honey (use agave if vegan)
• 1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
• 1 teaspoon sesame oil
• 1 teaspoon olive oil
• Water to thin, if necessary

Instructions

1. To cook quinoa: Rinse quinoa with cold water in mesh strainer. In a medium saucepan, bring 1 ½ cups of water to a boil. Add in quinoa and bring mixture to a boil. Cover, reduce heat to low and let simmer for 15 minutes or until quinoa has absorbed all of the water. Remove from heat and fluff quinoa with fork; place in large bowl and set aside to cool for about 10 minutes. You should have a little over 2 cups of quinoa.
2. To make dressing: Add peanut butter and honey or agave to a medium microwave safe bowl; heat in microwave for 20 seconds. Add in ginger, soy sauce, vinegar, and both sesame and olive oil and stir until mixture is smooth and creamy. If you want a thinner dressing, simply stir in a teaspoon or two of water or olive oil.
3. Add as much or as little dressing as you’d like to the quinoa. I always start out with a little bit of dressing and usually add more to suit my taste preferences. Alternatively you can save the dressing for later and add when you are ready to eat; however the flavors of the dressing usually soak into the salad so I love adding it to the quinoa first.
4. Next fold in red pepper, onion, cabbage, carrots, and cilantro into the quinoa. Garnish with cashews and green onions. Serve chilled or at room temperature with lime wedges if desired.

Well well well my friends this was AWESOME!!! Oh baby we both loved it! Logan of course had to put extra dressing on his because drenched salad is his kind of thing. I thought mine could use a little extra too but putting some water in the dressing I think would have done the trick so that there was a bit more of it. Some other revisions I’d make – less cilantro and more cashews. We also did use edamame (which are simply just soy beans) and natural honey roasted peanut butter which I think both were/are totally necessary :)

Now I feel the need to talk to you about quinoa. Yes, it’s one of those words that you look at and go what the blink does that say? It’s also associated with the veggie community a lot. Well as a former carnivore Logan will tell you that it’s not just for the veg heads it’s for everyone. I personally love it because it’s so versatile and incredibly healthier than noodles or rice. Texture wise when cooked it’s kind of between a noodle and rice, but has a slight nuttiness to it. It is actually a seed of all things. I have cooked and baked with it. Used it in casseroles that were not crazy flavored like the buffalo chicken quinoa I made one night, and it was awesome in both. It really is an all around great ingredient. If you are curious it’s pronounced “KEEN-wah” but if you are in this house we like to call it “ke-NO-uh” which is completely wrong.

What I hope you take from this post is … to go buy some damn quinoa already!

Would I Make it Again: Try and Stop Me!
Noming Score: 4.5/5