Shaved Spring Vegetable and Apple Salad with Ginger-Dijon Dressing
Goodbye stew season, hello spring. We’re taking in all the fresh produce we can get, starting with this shaved spring vegetable salad with ginger-dijon dressing from Kirsten Buck’s new cookbook, Buck Naked Kitchen.
“After a long cold winter, nothing makes me happier than seeing spring produce roll in at the markets,” Buck writes. “It’s like the light at the end of the tunnel for those of us living in the north, and I can’t wait to start creating fresh, beautiful dishes. I like to shave the raw vegetables very thin on my mandoline—it makes for a beautiful salad with lots of color and texture.”
The tangy-sweet-spicy dressing, while homemade, is impossible to mess up (it comes together entirely in a blender). “I did a happy dance in my kitchen the day the dressing tested perfectly,” Buck continues, “and now it is something I make weekly all year long.”
Excerpted from Buck Naked Kitchen © 2020 by Kirsten Buck. Photography © 2020 by Kirsten Buck. Reproduced by permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. All rights reserved.
Ingredients
Dressing
½ cup avocado oil or light-tasting olive oil
¼ cup apple cider vinegar
3 tablespoons grated fresh ginger
3 tablespoons Dijon mustard
2 tablespoons pure maple syrup
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
Salad
½ head purple cauliflower, shaved thin on a mandoline
½ head white cauliflower, shaved thin on a mandoline
1 Gala apple, sliced into matchsticks on a mandoline
6 stalks asparagus, shaved
1 cup snap peas, split
¼ cup finely diced red onion
¼ cup hemp hearts or sunflower seeds (see note in Directions tab)
½ cup Ginger-Dijon Dressing
Fresh mint and parsley leaves, finely chopped
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
Directions
1. Make the Dressing: In a blender or food processor, combine ¼ cup cup water with the oil, vinegar, ginger, mustard, maple syrup, salt and pepper, to taste. Pulse until smooth and creamy. Use immediately or store in the refrigerator for up to 1 week.
2. Make the Salad: Combine the cauliflower, apple, asparagus, snap peas, red onion and hemp hearts in a large salad bowl.
3. Just before serving, add the dressing and toss. Add the fresh mint and parsley and season with salt and pepper to taste.
Note: Hemp hearts are the seeds of the hemp plant, commonly grown in the Northern Hemisphere. They are very versatile and have a rich nutty flavor. If you cannot find hemp hearts at your local grocery store, raw sunflower seeds work great too!
Dressing
140 calories
14g fat
4g carbs
0g protein
3g sugars
Salad
167 calories
7g fat
20g carbs
9g protein
9g sugars