Eye for a Recipe

This refreshing salad from Canadian Living features a delicious miso dressing and soba noodles, which are made from buckwheat. This is a great vegetarian entrée and also goes well with grilled fish or chicken. I halved the dressing and used 175 g of noodles and still had six servings. This would also be good with spaghetti or linguine noodles. Because miso is quite salty, I did not add the ½ tsp of salt to the dressing.

Avoiding Additives and Preservatives

Use fresh lemon juice, real maple syrup and miso paste with no colour or preservatives added.

Ingredients:

Miso Dressing

½ cup (125 ml) vegetable oil

¼ cup (60 ml) lemon juice

3 tablespoons (45 ml) white or yellow miso paste

2 tablespoons (30 ml) maple syrup

2 tablespoons (30 ml) grated fresh ginger

1 clove garlic, minced

½ teaspoon (2.5 ml) salt (optional)

¼ teaspoon (1 ml) cayenne pepper

Salad

225 g soba noodles

1 cup (250 ml) sugar snap peas, trimmed

1 cup (250 ml) bite-size broccoli florets

1 sweet red pepper, thinly sliced

Quarter red onion, thinly sliced

Quarter English cucumber, halved lengthwise and sliced crosswise

½ cup (125 ml) chopped fresh cilantro (with stems)

¼ cup (60 ml) natural (skin-on) almonds, toasted and chopped

Preparation:

Miso Dressing: In large bowl, whisk together oil, lemon juice, miso paste, maple syrup, ginger, garlic, salt (if using) and cayenne pepper. Set aside.

Salad: In saucepan of boiling water, cook noodles according to package instructions. Drain and rinse under cold water; drain well. Set aside.

Meanwhile, in separate saucepan of boiling salted water, cook snap peas and broccoli until tender-crisp, about 2 minutes. Drain and transfer to bowl of ice water to chill; drain well.

Thinly slice snap peas; place in large bowl. Add broccoli, red pepper, onion and cucumber; toss with half of the dressing. Add noodles and cilantro; gently toss with remaining dressing. Sprinkle with almonds. Serves 6.

From Canadian Living