Cucumber, seaweed, and soba noodle salad

This easy, light salad combines a few ingredients into a subtle, delicious vegan dish that’s ready fast and is a great lunch or dinner option. #meandthemoose #lunch #dinner #recipes #easyrecipes #vegan #vegetarian

Before the well of summer cucumbers runs dry, make this easy, light salad that’s ready in a snap and is, at least in this house, very kid-approved!

Take me to the recipe!

This easy, light salad combines a few ingredients into a subtle, delicious vegan dish that’s ready fast and is a great lunch or dinner option. #meandthemoose #lunch #dinner #recipes #easyrecipes #vegan #vegetarian

We eat a lot of Japanese food in our house, so my love for these ingredients runs deep. I absolutely can’t turn down a seaweed salad. Ditto nutty buckwheat soba noodles. Unlike whole wheat or other whole grain noodles, soba doesn’t have that gummy (unless you WAAAAAY overcook it!) or gritty texture that can plague say, whole what spaghetti, so the flavor of the noodles really shines.

Everything about this salad is subtle. There aren’t any overwhelming flavors and all of the elements are in harmony with each other: A little salty, a little sweet, a little nutty, a little tangy, a little briny, and a little cool. The seaweed adds a salty, funky flavor and a little crunch. The cucumber adds even more crunch and and is a cooler counterpoint to the sauce that’s made of soy, rice vinegar, brown sugar, and sesame oil.

While this is a light salad that we usually eat as a side (though I’ve had it alone for lunch and it’s V satisfying), the soba offer some heft that leaves you feeling pretty full. My 6-year-old loves it because he loves anything with soy sauce and my almost 18-month-old loves it because he would eat noodles all day, every day.

But the real key to this salad is getting rid of the excess water from the cucumbers, noodles, and rehydrated seaweed. It’s a funny recipe because you have to add water to each element before you get rid of it. But the more you squeeze out, the more potent the sauce tastes. It’s worth a little elbow grease!

This easy, light salad combines a few ingredients into a subtle, delicious vegan dish that’s ready fast and is a great lunch or dinner option. #meandthemoose #lunch #dinner #recipes #easyrecipes #vegan #vegetarian

This easy, light salad combines a few ingredients into a subtle, delicious vegan dish that’s ready fast and is a great lunch or dinner option. #meandthemoose #lunch #dinner #recipes #easyrecipes #vegan #vegetarian

A couple of notes:

• I used hijiki seaweed in developing this recipe because I love it, but have JUST NOW learned that it naturally contains a really high level of inorganic arsenic, which can be carcinogenic to humans. Whoopsie daisy. Instead, sub in wakame, which doesn’t contain the same levels of arsenic and is prepared roughly the same way—just rehydrate in water while you prep the rest of the salad.

• In the US, you can find dried wakame seaweed in Japanese grocery stores, health food stores, or in the all-purpose grocery store (our Whole Foods has it).

• Before you add the rice vinegar, check your bottle’s label and see if you have plain rice vinegar or “seasoned” rice vinegar. The “seasoned” variety has some added sugar already, so I decrease the brown sugar a little bit to avoid over-sweetening the sauce. See recipe note for exact changes.

This easy, light salad combines a few ingredients into a subtle, delicious vegan dish that’s ready fast and is a great lunch or dinner option. #meandthemoose #lunch #dinner #recipes #easyrecipes #vegan #vegetarian

Cucumber, seaweed, and soba noodle salad

Time: About 35 minutes
Yield: About 6 cups of salad

6 Tbsp dried seaweed (wakame or hijiki, but see note above!)
2 cups hot water
1 large cucumber, thinly sliced
1 tsp salt 
9 oz buckwheat soba noodles (2 bundles)
3-4 Tbsp unseasoned rice vinegar*
1.5 tsp brown sugar*
4 tsp soy sauce
4 tsp sesame oil
2 tsp white or black sesame seeds 

*if using “seasoned” rice vinegar, decrease the sugar to 1 tsp

Combine the dried seaweed with 2 cups of your hottest water from the tap (you can use boiling water, but hot water works just fine, in my experience). Set aside.

Slice the cucumber into very thin slices. Using a mandolin is great here, but if you don’t have one, a vegetable peeler also does the trick. Or just practice your knife skills- whatever works!

Place the cucumber slices in a strainer and top with 1 tsp salt. Massage a little with your hands and let sit in the sink to drain while you make the rest of the salad.

Boil the water. When the water boils, add the soba noodles and cook according to the package directions (usually about 5 minutes).

While the noodles cook, make the sauce. Combine the rice vinegar, sugar, soy sauce, and sesame oil in a small container and shake to combine.

When the noodles are cooked, drain very well. I even use a few paper towels to dab up some of the excess water.

Add the noodles to a large bowl and set aside.

Drain the seaweed really well. Again, I use a few paper towels to soak up some of the excess water, but I DO NOT squeeze out the seaweed.

Add the seaweed to the noodles in a large bowl and set aside again.

Rinse the salt off of the cucumbers and drain well. Add the cucumbers to a paper towel, cheesecloth, or dish towel and squeeze to remove as much excess water as possible. Add to the bowl of noodles and seaweed.

Stir the cucumbers, seaweed, and noodles to combine. Top with the sauce and stir well to coat.

Just before serving, top with sesame seeds.

Sesame roasted brussels sprouts

OMG Halloween hangover. The ten pounds of candy I ate between opening the bags at 11 am (why? WHY?) and going to bed at 9 pm (which felt like midnight), have done a number on my body. I guess it’s a good sign that I feel like shit? Maybe it shows that I don’t normally eat 10,000 grams of sugar in 10 hours?

Anyhoo, we started the day with a small fit because I wouldn’t let someone eat candy for breakfast, so…that was fun.

One key to weaning my little back to veggies after a sugar binge is to make them extra unctuous and delicious. These brussels fit the bill. High heat makes them mellow and crispy while the garlic, ginger, soy sauce, and sesame oil add layers of salt and fat that lead to really big flavor.

A couple of notes:

• It’s important to work fast after getting the roasted sprouts out of the oven. Their heat will cook the garlic a bit and without it, the taste can be pretty strong.

• If you think you’ll have leftovers, sprinkle the sesame seeds on the individual portions, or just the part you’ll eat right away. The seeds can burn when you recrisp the leftovers.

Serve them with a piece of fish, some tofu, some rotisserie chicken, or accompanying any other protein. I also like them next to these noodles for a double dose of veggies. You could actually slap some chicken thighs on another sheet pan and roast them all together if your oven is big enough.

Sesame roasted Brussels sprouts  

1 ¼ lb brussels sprouts, halved (or two 10 oz bags)
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 tsp grated fresh ginger (about a 1-inch piece)
2 Tbsp soy sauce or tamari, divided
1 small garlic clove, minced 
1 Tbsp toasted sesame oil
1½- 2 Tbsp honey
1 Tbsp toasted sesame seeds

Preheat the oven to 425.

In a large bowl, combine the veggies, olive oil, 1 Tbsp of soy sauce, and the grated ginger. Mix well. If you see any clumps of ginger, separate them the best you can.

Spread onto a baking sheet and roast for 15-17 minutes (or until you’ve reached peak crispyness, since oven temps vary), stirring once in the middle of cooking.

While the veggies are roasting, mince your garlic and combine it with the remaining 1 Tbsp of soy sauce, sesame oil, and honey.

When the sprouts are roasted, quickly spoon them back into your original bowl. Add the garlic mixture and stir well. Serve immediately.

If reheating this, place the servings you’ll need back into a 425 oven for about 5 minutes (or as long as needed) to re-crisp.

Yield: about 3 cups of sprouts, or 4 servings.

Sheet pan dinner: Miso fish with edamame and corn succotash

This might actually be the fastest dinner I know how to make. These are white fish steaks, but if you go for flatter, thinner fillets, it's even quicker! Either way, this dish is certainly faster than ordering bad-for-you takeout.

And this week, we definitely needed some easy, healthy dinners to help avoid the end-of-day, burned-out, bad decisions that sometimes happen at dinner time. I've been home with a super sick kid for the past few days and after just two weeks of M being in preschool, I forgot how exhausting it is to take care of a small person all day.

What I love about this dish is that it tastes kind of subtle. It's tangy and salty and certainly flavorful enough for the adults and older kids, but mild enough for the younger set if they don't love strong flavors.

The sauce really makes this dish. It requires miso paste, which you might not have on hand, but is super easy to find at the grocery store or Japanese specialty store. If needs must, you can order it on amazon. I used a red miso paste, but red or white would work fine in this recipe.

Because miso tends to be really salty, I don't add any extra sodium to this dish, but feel free to add a pinch at the end if that suits your taste.

Miso fish with edamame and corn succotash

For the sauce:
4 Tbsp miso
2 large garlic cloves
2-inch piece of ginger, peeled
2 Tbsp avocado or other neutral oil
2 Tbsp sesame oil
2 Tbsp rice vinegar
1/8- ¼ tsp red pepper flakes (optional)

1½-1¾ lb white fish (about 4-5 medium steaks)
2 cups frozen edamame (shelled)
1 ½ cups frozen corn kernels
1 Tbsp salted butter, cubed

For serving:
2-3 large scallions, sliced
2-3 large zucchini, spiralized into noodles –or-
1 package of soba noodles, cooked according to directions –or-
4-5 cups brown rice, cooked according to directions

Preheat oven to 375. Make your sauce by placing all of the ingredients in a food processor and blitzing until the sauce resembles chunky peanut butter. Set aside.

Scatter the frozen edamame and corn over the sheet pan. Place your fish on top of the veggies and spread a scant tablespoon of the sauce over each filet.

Bake for 8-10 minutes, until the fish starts to flake fairly easily with a fork. 

Remove the pan and scatter small cubes of butter around the veggies. Return to the heat and cook for 4-5 more minutes. Remove from the oven and top with sliced scallions.

Mix half of the leftover sauce with your zoodles, noodles, or rice and then add more to taste. Top each serving of zoodles, noodles, or rice with one fish filet and a portion of the veggies.

Yield: 4-5 servings, depending on how many fish steaks you use.