Hearty Asian Salad

With Thanksgiving in only one week, it is the perfect time to eat well. I'm talking clean. The heavy, comfort food is on its way-- so a good way to prepare for what's ahead is to stick with light, easy salads for lunch or dinner.

Fit Momma Crystal sent this recipe to me quite some time ago. Frankly, I shoved to the back of the cookbook because of one ominous ingredient:

tofu.

Whoa! I have eaten tofu in restaurants several times before and enjoyed it, but never have I actually purchased it and prepared it myself.

This week I was more daring than usual, and bought the darn stuff. I found it in the produce section at my grocery store. It turns out I was intimidated for nothing. It comes in soft, medium, and hard consistencies -- I stuck with the medium just to be safe. Tofu is kind of a follower, it really doesn't have a distinctive taste and will just take on whatever taste you give it.

This salad also has another protein packer:

edamame.

What? Never had edamame? It is a long, fancy word for soybeans. You can find them shelled in your freezer section. Delicious.

As usual, I made myself a nice big batch of this stuff and ate it all week long. And I got some serious protein with the tofu and edamame -- I'll save the meat for next week! :)

From November 2009

Hearty Asian Salad
by Crystal Bowman

In a salad bowl combine dressing:
1 tsp fresh grated ginger (mine was not fresh! It was from a little bottle)
1 Tbs soy sauce
1 Tbs olive oil
1/2 tsp salt

Layer on the following salad ingredients:
4 oz. tofu cubed
1 cucumber diced
1 red pepper diced
2 stalks of celery diced (I didn't have celery so I diced up a green pepper instead)
1 cup shelled edamame (green soybeans)
1/2 cup sliced almonds
1 Tbs sesame seeds

Toss all and serve.

If you are storing this: The only thing that didn't keep well over the week were the almonds -- they got a little soft. I suggest leaving those out and adding them fresh each day.

Enjoy! Thanks for the recipes, gals! Keep them comin'!

See all Trainer Momma recipes here.