Things I Eat: Now That's a Salad

What up food-citizens?

Check out this super-easy, mostly raw-vegan dinner that is beyond delicious!

You: Whoa, that’s a lot of vegetables. I don’t think that can be good. I had veggies once and they were bad.
Amanda: You have no idea – I’ll take you on a flavor adventure!

 Plus, you can eat as much as you want which is how good food should be. Let's review the ingredients!

Ingredients

• Rice Noodles: Boil up some rice noodles – I like the fettuccine noodles – especially if I am using chopsticks. Different types of noodles have actually been engineered for different reasons (Check out the Pasta Dictionary for more info). Rice noodles are like $1-$2 a pack at Trader Joe’s, by the way. Rice noodles are a great backdrop, hard to mess up and don’t have as nutty of a flavor as wheat noodles. Since I avoid wheat.
• Broccoli: Broc is earthy and full of textures that can easily be modified by cutting it in different ways. Raw broccoli can be bitter and intense where steamed broccoli is mellow and smooth. Most people know mushy, weird broccoli and hate it. I’m totally ok thawing out some broc and being done with it, but, if you need some magic – preheat your oven to 425, lay your boc on a cooking sheet (put some tin foil on there so you don’t have to clean anything), toss with olive oil, salt and pepper and roast in the oven 20-25 minutes, until some part are brown and caramelized in deliciousness.
• Sweet potatoes: Sweet, crunchy and absorbent of flavors with no aftertaste, it will support anything you do and goes excellently with savory! If you have a sweet tooth, this addition is like “what awesome just happened to my life?!” when consumed – Just go to town on it with your veggie peeler and get some nice thin strips all up in your bowl. YES, you eat this raw. It's ok. Trust me.
• Sun dried tomatoes: Ever lick tomato paste? Yeah, sweet, acidly strips of sun dried tomatoes are bursts of intense flavor. I keep a jar and/or bag in my fridge and toss them into whatever. Since you won’t taste them in every bite, they add a lot of taste-bud interest. 
• Toasted sesame seeds: Not just for take out! Trust me, these little seeds-of-the-gods add a nutty flavor and light texture to any dish (Also high in mineral content and calcium and containing two proteins that are not normally found in other vegetable proteins, my sassy sweet meat-haters).

What You Do

Next, let’s chat FLAVOR! First, I enjoy making different combinations in my bowl - maybe taking a little

more of one thing over another thing. With these simple ingredients – you have 5 foods so you could have like 31 unique combination possibilities for your mouth and soul.

Most people would dump some type of cream sauce, cheese or whatever on this and call it a day. What do you mean salad dressing? Anything to mask the purity of these items.They are the worst!

You can get rich flavors using touches of totally simple things! I'm not going to tell you what to do, you got to try all this out yourself because food should be personal. Here is what you need:

• Flavored oil: Flavored oil is fantastic and a little drizzle will do you up real good – it is absorbed into foods, can carry flavor and gives you a kick of fats that your body craves! Get yourself some flavored oils and get your mind blown! Basil oil? Olive oil? Red pepper oil? Garlic oil? I don't know you, you do your thing. If you are like “I’m not going to get flavored oils, ever” just use olive oil and some garlic powder or basil flakes. It’ll do – but won’t be as awesome as the flavor from an infused oil.
• Soy Sauce: If you are sticking with an Asian palette, this will deliver you that kick you want. You could use Sriracha, too.
• Salt: Be careful of if you are using soy sauce - if not sprinkle on a little sea salt – or some Iodized table salt because you DO need some iodine in your diet if you are like me and use sea salt for almost anything. Table salt is good for you.

What I Did

I have a garlic infused grapeseed oil that is the best ever. I drizzle a little garlic oil over my mixture, and add a little olive oil – the garlic is for flavor but it can be intense so a little olive oil helps move it around.

Let’s chat about soy sauce and how much over processed, over salted soy sucks.

Glad we agree!

I use Bragg's Liquid Amino which is a liquid protein concentrate that contains 16 amino acids – the mofo building blocks of LIFE – but tastes just like junky soy sauce. Make good choices, people. Give a couple squirts of that on there and mix it up. Give everything a moment to get all acquainted with everything, then get your favorite part of chopsticks and dig in!   

You: Wait, did you just dump some veggies into a bowl with noodles and add some like soy sauce and oil?
Amanda: You better believe it.
You: So, this took you about the same amount of time to boil water?
Amanda: Yeppers – about 25 minutes, let’s say, if you roasted the broc.
You: And, you have like one pasta pot and a cookie sheet to clean up? Plus a bowl?
Amanda: Sloth is my favorite. Sometimes I use noodles I made the day before.
You: This doesn't seem glamorous at all – not like on the Food Network where people with very white teeth talk about how great they are at making a mess.
Amanda: This ain't Hollywood snob food – this is sweatpant and sloth good eatin’!

Image Credit:
Oils from olioandolive.com