July 14, 2016 by britt

Thai peanut salad with coconut rice

For the coconut rice:

1-1/2 cups dry organic jasmine rice
1 (15oz) can organic unsweetened coconut milk (you will use the milk AND the cream from the can)
1 cup water
1/2 tsp. sea salt
1/4 tsp. organic garlic powder or fresh garlic minced

Place the rice in a saucepan with water, coconut milk, salt and garlic powder.
Stir to combine the ingredients. Bring to a boil, then cover and reduce heat to low.
Cook for about 30 minutes. Rice will be tender and liquid will be absorbed.

*This coconut rice was sweet, but had that hint of savory which was delicious.
However, if you wanted it completely sweet, remove the garlic powder
and add 1-1/2 tablespoons of organic cane sugar.
I made the rice again the next day because I knew I wanted A LOT of coconut rice on
my salad, so do yourself a favor and double the recipe!

For the dressing:

1/8 cup rice vinegar
1/4 cup thai sweet red chili sauce
1 tsp. sesame oil
1 tsp. organic cane sugar
pinch of salt

Whisk all ingredients in a bowl. Use organic ingredients, if possible.
This dressing was so good on it, but if you’re looking for a different flavor,
see two more dressing options below.

For the salad:

4 cups organic napa cabbage
1 red or yellow pepper, diced
1 cup grated carrots (I bought a bag of organic pre-shredded carrots from Whole Foods)
3 green onions, chopped
1/8 cup fresh basil, chopped
1/4 cup cilantro, chopped
1/2 cup organic dry roasted peanuts, chopped
fresh ginger, minced
fresh lime juice, cut limes in wedges
optional: organic shredded chicken (I bought cooked and pre shredded chicken from Whole Foods)
You definitely don’t need the chicken. The coconut rice gives the salad substance.

Directions:
In a large bowl combine cabbage, red/yellow pepper, carrots, green onions, basil, cilantro, and chicken (if using.)
Do not add peanuts, ginger or lime juice to the salad bowl (you’ll see why below)

I stored certain ingredients separately. I kept the salad in a large Ziploc bag,
the coconut rice in a separate Ziploc bag and the dressing in a
small tupperware container. Even the chicken had it’s own bag as well
as the lime wedges.

* Individual salads were topped with dressing,
coconut rice, chopped peanuts, fresh minced ginger and lime juice.

Notes:
As I ate it over the next few days I loved that the salad and toppings
were fresh and crisp because they weren’t getting soggy from the
dressing being mixed in. It also gave me the option of transforming the
salad by leaving out and adding just a few ingredients, or having the option
of no meat.
It went from a thai chicken salad to a southwestern salad by leaving out
the ginger and peanuts and adding corn, black beans and topping it
with a dairy-free homemade ranch. Because of this, it wouldn’t be a
bad idea to double the salad recipe.

Below is the recipe for the second and third dressing options:

Ginger Peanut Sauce

1/3 cup peanut butter
2 TBSP honey
1-3 tsp. freshly grated ginger
2 TBSP rice vinegar
2 tsp. sesame oil
water to thin

Ginger Lime Dressing

4 TBSP lime juice
3 TSBP fish sauce (red boat brand-I found this at whole foods)
1 inch piece of fresh ginger, peeled and grated/minced
2 tsp. red pepper flakes
slowly whisk in 3 TBSP extra virgin olive oil
add honey to taste

This third option would be a good one to consider adding brown rice pad thai noodles to the salad.

I will post the dairy-free ranch dressing recipe for the southwestern version in the next post.

coconut rice adapted from hostthetoast.com, ginger peanut sauce from hostthetoast.com, dressing adapted from bestsaladstipsblogspot.fr, salad adapted from wendypolisi.com, ginger lime dressing from wendypolisi.com