I tried to come up with a snappy name for this post, but this salad has so many ingredients that it was difficult to decide which deserved to be front and centre.  Since the dressing is made with peanut butter and ginger, these flavours are in every bite.  And quinoa, well, I can’t hide the fact that we have been eating quite a bit of this grain, as you can see from previous posts.

Spring is finally here, so I wanted to make something that was bright and flavourful.  Thinking of spring and summer meals, my mind switches into salad gear.  This is a bit of a challenge when I want to make something new that I can share with you.  My salad repertoire is not that large.  Go to summer meals for us include broccoli salad and potato salad, as well as black bean and corn salsa and let’s not forget about coleslaw.  These items find themselves on our dinner table and being brought to functions on a regular basis.  This year I also hope to include roasted beet salad into the summer rotation.

Boy oh boy, you can really tell I have been thinking a lot about salads!

So, I wanted to make a new salad.  I searched the internet and noticed quite a few recipes for Thai salads.  As I reviewed them, I saw peanut and ginger mentioned as the prominent dressing ingredients.  I like these flavours, so I thought this would work.

To make my life easier, I bought a package of coleslaw (not dressed) that I added to the salad.  I could have bought cabbage and carrots and spent the time shredding them…actually I could have had my food processer do all the work – but I guess I was just lazy…that already shredded coleslaw mix found its way into my grocery cart pretty quick! 🙂

Everything else that was needed, I had at home.  I had to put aside the cashews a few days before I made the salad, as I knew that Jamie and I would snack on them until they were gone.  I can’t be the only one that has that issue, can I?  I find that if I buy nuts, especially if they are roasted or salted, I can go through them like nothing.  The problem is that I normally get them in the big family size containers, but there are only two of us!  I guess it is better than snacking on chips….maybe? 🙂

I digress….I whipped up the salad in no-time.  As the quinoa was cooking, I sliced the ginger and made the dressing. From start to finish, it didn’t even take an hour.  And, it made a lot.  We ate it for three meals, two lunches and one dinner.  It is a pretty economical meal for a family.  We had it hot and cold, both were great, but I have to admit, eating it cold, once the dressing had time to really soak into the rest of the ingredients, was my favourite.

Mission accomplished:  One more salad recipe to add to our summer rotation!

Adapted from:
Ambitious Kitchen
Crunchy Cashew Thai Quinoa Salad with Ginger Peanut Dressing

Ingredients:

Salad

• 2 cups cooked quinoa
• I package shredded coleslaw mix
• 3 scallions, sliced
• 1 red pepper, diced
• 1 orange pepper, diced
• 1 cup cashew pieces
• 1 can chickpeas, strained and rinsed

Dressing

• 1/3 cup crunchy peanut butter
• 4 tsp. freshly grated ginger
• 4 tbsp. soya sauce
• 1 tbsp. honey
• 1 tbsp. red wine vinegar
• 2 tsp sesame seed oil
• 1 tbsp. water

Directions:

1. Make your dressing.  Add peanut butter and honey to a small frying pan.  Heat over low heat until blended together.  Remove from heat and add in ginger, soya sauce, vinegar and sesame oil.  Whisk ingredients together.  Add in water to desired consistency.
2. Mix together all your salad ingredients in a large bowl.
3. Add as much dressing as you would like to your salad.  (we added all of it)
4. Mix together and enjoy!