At once cooling and warming, refreshing and comforting, familiar and exotic, this salad is bursting with delightful tastes, colours and textures, using a palette of Japanese flavours to surprise the taste buds.
I’ve loved making and eating salads for a long time. In particular, I’ve loved discovering ways of making salads more delicious. Salads get a bad rap from a lot of omnivores out there, and judging by what they serve you in restaurants, even some of the pricier ones, I don’t blame them. Who wants to eat a pile of insipid, industrially-grown vegetables that requires additive-laden dressings or a hefty amount of sugar in order to be remotely palatable.
Shiso leaves (Perilla frutescens var. crispa) on the left, and daikon radish sprouts on the right
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, a salad is “a cold dish of various mixtures of raw or cooked vegetables, usually seasoned with oil, vinegar, or other dressing and sometimes accompanied by meat, fish, or other ingredients”.
That’s a very broad definition! It leaves a lot of room of interpretation, or rather, for imagination and creativity. Most importantly, I am delighted to say that, after meticulously scanning the definition, I did not even once find the word “lettuce”.
Umeboshi (pickled plum) citrus dressing
In fact, when I am making a salad, I do not think of lettuce and dressing. In fact, my salads rarely contain anything formally classified as lettuce. Instead, I think of how I can combine different flavours, colours and textures to create a dish that delights the senses. For example:
Flavours
Smoky, nutty (toasted sesame seeds, toasted sesame oil)
Sweet (vine-ripened cherry tomatoes, ponzu, mirin)
Umami (prawns, shio koji, tamari, ponzu, umeboshi, wakame, nori, mirin)
Sharp, peppery, spicy (scallions, shallots, shiso, ginger, pepper, arugula)
Tart, acidic (lemon zest, umeboshi, ponzu, rice vinegar)
Salty (shio koji, tamari, umeboshi, ponzu, nori)
Textures
Juicy (prawns, tomatoes)
Crunchy (carrots, prawns, radish sprouts, sesame seeds)
Chewy (lightly-steamed kale)
Creamy (avocado)
Slimy (wakame)
A Few More Tips
Quality matters. Compare the flavour, aroma and nutrition of a vine-ripened dark red cherry tomatoes to those of a ethylene-gas ripened beefsteak tomato.
Cutting technique matters. Thin slices of red onion are delectable. A block of red onion is obtrusive. Shredded or julienned carrots produce a very different sensation from chopped ones.
Vinegar, water, oil and salt change the texture and taste of vegetables — for better and for worse. Soaking certain vegetables in water can reduce their astringency. By adding shallots or onions to a dressing, you lose their crunchy texture but add a pleasant sharpness to the oils and vinegars. Salt can soften tough slices of cabbage by drawing the water out through osmosis. Delicate leafy vegetables lose their crispness you add the dressing too early.
I love making variations on this salad. I could eat it many days in a row and not get tired of it. It has a plethora of ingredients, but somehow, they all blend together to create pleasant sensations in the mouth, at once cooling and warming, refreshing and comforting, familiar and exotic. Give it a try! …And feel free to substitute half the ingredients. The salad bowl is your canvas. Be creative. Tap into your senses. The sky is the limit.
Joëlle
Serves 2
At once cooling and warming, refreshing and comforting, familiar and exotic, this salad is bursting with delightful tastes, colours and textures, using a palette of Japanese flavours to surprise the taste buds.
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Ingredients
- 3 cups greens (I used kale, arugula and daikon radish sprouts)
- 2 tbsp wakame flakes
- 1/2 cup cherry tomatoes, halved
- 1/3 cup grated carrots
- 2 scallions, thinly sliced
- 12 medium prawns
- 1 avocado, sliced
- 2-inch piece ginger, julienned
- 5-6 shiso leaves, chiffonaded
- 1/2 tbsp white sesame seeds, toasted
- 1/2 tbsp black sesame seeds, toasted
- Zest of 1 lemon
- 2 tbsp avocado oil
- 2 tbsp rice vinegar
- 1 tbsp ponzu (Recipe here)
- 1 tbsp shio koji* (Recipe here)
- 1 tbsp tamari
- 1 tbsp toasted sesame oil
- 2 tsp mirin
- 1 tsp umeboshi paste
- 1 shallot, minced
- Black pepper, to taste
Instructions
- Prepare the dressing the mixing all the ingredients together.
- Bring water to a boil over medium heat. Add prawns and cook for 1-2 minutes. Remove prawns with a slotted spoon and places them in an ice bath to stop the cooking. When they are cool enough to the touch, remove the shells.
- Soak wakame flakes in a bowl of cold water until rehydrated, about 8 minutes. Drain.
- Soak ginger strips in cold water for 5 minutes to reduce astringency. Drain.
- Toast black and white sesame seeds over medium heat until they start to crackle.
- Assemble all the salad ingredients into a large bowl, add the dressing and garnish with shiso, ginger and sesame seeds. いただきます！
Notes
Shio koji (塩麹) is a lacto-fermented mixture of rice koji (rice inoculated with aspergillus oryzae spore -- the basis for many well-know Japanese ferments such as miso, sake and soy sauce). It provides enzymes and probiotics while imparting the dish with a unique umami flavour. You can substitute sea salt, himalayan salt or fish sauce. To learn more about shio koji, how to make it at home, and how to use it in the kitchen, click here. Ponzu (ポン酢) is a Japanese citrus-based sauce made with soy sauce, mirin, bonito fish flakes, kelp and an assortment of citrus zests and juices. Learn how to make it (Recipe here).
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