Avocado Wasabi Salad
Yes, I know. It’s a salad.
Who wants to go to a vegan website and see a recipe for salad? I keep salads to an absolute minimum around here. So when one does show up, it’s a freakin’ delicious salad.
And this one is definitely freakin’ delicious.
I’ve had the idea of an avocado based salad dressing kicking around in my head for the last few days, and an avocado kicking around my kitchen counter. This salad is easy to throw together, and is a great entree salad, or a side salad for a dinner party or some such get-together.
The dressing is rich, and despite the title, is pretty damn tasty even without the added wasabi. You have my permission to leave the wasabi powder out altogether if you don’t like it or can’t find it.
I don’t know if my wasabi powder is old and has lost its kick, or if you need a massive amount of it to make things spicy (anyone with experience want to weigh in?), but this dressing was as mild as the day is long. It added a great flavor, but no heat. You may wish to add in your own wasabi powder slowly, tasting as you go, just in case yours is spicy.
The other ingredients are simple but flavorful as well. Pan-fried wasabi-soy chickpeas, sauteed broccoli, toasted almonds, and shredded carrots. I find this mixture goes particularly well together, adding crunch, sweetness, protein, and color. And they all pair wonderfully with the dressing.
Speaking of the dressing, it’s pretty ugly stuff. This isn’t something you’re going to want to serve on the side for your guests. Toss it with the lettuce and then serve it. Just trust me on this one. You’ll see when you make it.
Avocado Wasabi Salad
Serves 4-6
Greens of your choice for 4-6 people
1 Carrot, shredded
2 tsp Vegetable Oil, divided
1/2 to 3/4 Cup Broccoli, chopped small
1/3 Cup Toasted Slivered Almonds
1 Recipe Wasabi Chickpeas, below
1 Recipe Avocado Wasabi dressing, below
Fresh Cracked Black Pepper
Wasabi-Tamari Chickpeas
1 tsp Oil
1 Cup Chickpeas
1 tsp Wasabi Powder
1/2 tsp Sugar
1 Tbs Low Sodium Tamari/Soy Sauce
Avocado Wasabi Dressing
1 Ripe Avocado, diced
2 tsp White Wine Vinegar
3 Tbs Hummus, plain or garlic
1 tsp Stoneground Mustard
1/2 tsp Salt
2 tsp Wasabi Powder
1/4 to 1/3 Cup Vegetable oil
Begin by whisking the dressing ingredients together, except for the oil. Whisk until smooth. If your avocado isn’t super ripe, you may wish to blend the dressing in a food processor. Slowly add oil until emulsified and the dressing is smooth, refrigerate until ready to use.
Toast your almonds in a dry pan over medium heat if they are not already toasted. Set aside.
In the same pan, add 1 tsp of oil and add broccoli. Sautee over high heat until the broccoli is beginning to color in spots and is bright green, but still tender-crisp. Sprinkle lightly with salt and set aside.
Add the second teaspoon of oil to the same pan and add the chickpeas. Reduce heat to medium-high. Cook the chickpeas until they are golden on all sides, using a spatula to loosen them as necessary, but don’t worry if they stick a little. Add the wasabi powder, sugar, and tamari and stir well. Remove from pan and set aside.
In a large bowl, add your salad greens. Add the broccoli, 3/4 of the chickpeas, 3/4 of the almonds, and 3/4 of the carrots. Toss with enough dressing to coat. Plate the salad, and garnish the top with the remaining chickpeas, almonds and carrots. Crack fresh black pepper over the top. Serve immediately.
If you are serving the salad later, do not add the dressing until the last minute.
PS – I have a new “like” button down there over the comments if you want to heart a recipe without commenting. :) And if you’re interested in what I’m cooking, and what us in line for the blog, become a fan on facebook.
The dressing itself stands alone!
I had a salad but realized I was out of dressing- looking through my bookmarks I found this dressing and lept at the chance to use up a ripe avocado.
I subbed red wine vinegar for the white wine vinegar,
and horseradish for the wasabi powder. SO GOOD.
Certainly not a boring salad!
I’m so annoyed by the people that come on here to complain about Lauren’s lack of blogging. It’s a blog people, you’ve benefitted from many free and delicious recipes. Blogging is time consuming, and a blog as artful and inventive as VYY is no doubt taxing.
You’re obviously fans if you’re irritated she’s not posting, otherwise why would you care? How many posts are up here? Countless! Stop complaining and go back and dig through all the free goodies on this site. Lauren doesn’t owe you anything, whether or not you bought her book. (Which I have and yes it is fantastic) I’m not speaking to the testers, however, as I know nothing about that, but it seems the majority of people here aren’t testers. So just shush up and stop being so hyper critical.
Cheers Lauren. THANK YOU for all your wonderful recipes!
To Melissa:
Listen, I used to like this blog allot until Lauren’s book came out and she decided to completely ignore her testers. There are plenty of recipe testers from the book that have yet to get a response or the promised copy of the book. Everyone has issues and I understand that, but she should at least show a little bit of respect to the people who helped her get the book made.
I don’t believe my comments were ungrateful or hatefull neither were the comments of the others who posted about the fact that Lolo has obviously ignored her blog since the publishing of her book and i think thats sad because if it weren’t for the blog or her its readers a lot less copies of her book would of sold. Like i stated earlier i think a post at least once a month would be fine, there are bloggers out their like vegan dad, susan from fat free vegan blog that have responsibilities like children but they manage to post onc a month or more, considering lolo stated that she quit her job to be more dedicated to her blog then why hasnt there been a post in like over three months? To the person that said my statements and the statements or others wou
d come back karmically to us, i believe in karma but like i said earlier i see nothing wrong with my comments. If you want to talk about bad karma tell it to lauren the same person who hasn’t given her testers the cookbook they earned after they spent money buying the ingredients and spent time making the recipes and giving lauren constructive criticism. Lauren is also the same person who had an agreement with Herbivore to have her book published with them but days before he book was to be published and after Josh Hooten spent thousands of dollars on her book, promotion for her, and lots of energy she pulled out of the deal because she wanted more money for each book sold. Their was a long and winding post on the ppk forum where Isa who haw had numerous cookbooks published, joanna voight and other vegan cookbook authors and others with knowledge of the industry all commented on the fact that lauren was getting a great deal from hebivore and it was better than the industry standard, and lolo and her husband even left comments and it was basically “oh well i didnt know”,she never even offered an apology, the agreement made was a verbal agreement which was kind of dumb so nothing could really havd been done legally. You need to tell her about karma not me
Thanks for all the great recipes!!!!!!!! They are amazing, I am so grateful for all the hard work!
peace
this looks so good and so healthy.
another healthy salad ( or kind of salad) that is very healthy is Chana Masala..
i love the wasabi twist :-)
I agree with j. There are a lot of other food blogs that i enjoy, but the drama on here is kinda fun. haha
I like your salade, it looks delicious!!
the salad sucked
I agree with J’s comment
Testers… agreed, what happened sounds shitty, but if Lauren Ulm hasn’t responded to any of your e-mails why are you all repetitively harassing her blog? To ensure that people think she’s a bad person so they don’t give her their business? What is going on here seems to be vindictive and immature. Ill-intentioned gossip has little place on a food blog and should have no place in the vegan community. Has the time come to move on?
no one is trying to take away from Lauren’s “business”, she does a good job of doing that herself. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion and whatever they decide based on what i or u said is their choice.BTW its not gossip when both her and her husband got on the ppk furum to post comments about the situation and her side of it which the information i got was posted by her on that website. Last time i checked its not gossip when it comes out of the persons mouth. I don’t think lying to people and cheating them out of money belongs in the vegan community either but guess who did all that. Everyone should form their own opinion and i’ve formed mine.
I agree, if there is one person who is taking away from Lauren’s business, it’s herself. She’s treated the testers like crap, ignored them, and denied them what was promised after they spent money and time helping her with her cookbook. The whole thing is kind of ridiculous.
I was going to buy her cookbook but definitely will buy a used copy so she doesn’t get any money out of it..
I think i can eat EVERYTHING with wasabi on. I love it sooooo much!
Salads are super food, don’t apologize for posting salads, at present I am having lots of salads, mostly every evening (pasta, rice and other carbo are for lunch) and, since I am just a veggie, not a vegan, I have far too much milk/yogurt for breakfast!!!
So evenings have to be salads and there can never be too many salads recipes!
Thank you, Avo and wasabi is great!
I’m sick of Lolo’s ridiculous fan club who stands by her side while she strings people along. All you needed to do, Lolo, was tell people that you weren’t interested in keeping up with the blog, or that you would post only sporadically. But to post a pathetic excuse about your “anxiety” that received hundreds of loving comments and to ONCE AGAIN abandon your readers is just downright shitty.
And to anyone who wonders why she is the target of such anger: it is because she was involved in a highly shady book deal, screwed over a bunch of people, and is now not giving her testers what they are owed.
I will never visit this blog again.
OK, Stacy and W, you missed the point entirely…. it was just that maybe you should move on and stop posting comments because it’s silly vindictive… and that’s not a good color on anyone, no matter what the other person did to deserve it. And by the way I’m not part of any fan club. Just trying to remind people about humility.
I am absolutely through with this blog.
I was going to get a cookbook off of amazon, but I’m just going to buy a used one to ensure that Lauren doesn’t get any of my money.
She’s neglected her testers, and her readers.
If she needs time, she should just say it instead of being so neglectful and immature.
does anyone know why Lolo hasn’t posted in so long?
The people who are speaking abusively or derisively about this blog or its writer need to back off. Like waaay the fudge off. Who’s to say why she’s taken a hiatus? I don’t know. I don’t think we need to criticize her for it. And I don’t really trust the people who are complaining here. I’d like to see some new recipes, but I’m not going to threaten to “leave and never come back” or anything.
Go visit some of the other great vegan blogs out there and stop obsessing over this one. It’ll still be here when you come back.
Seconding, ryan, here. There’s no excuse for vicious personal attacks. I’m disappointed that she hasn’t blogged more, because I’m fascinated by her recipes and often make them. But these personal attacks are completely unnecessary, no matter how wronged you feel.
the salad looks awesome. i’m very guilty of not eating enough salad because i’m just not a good salad-maker.
my wasabi doesn’t add that much of a kick either. i was always afraid to use “too much” but it doesn’t seem like a little goes a long way as far as wasabi goes.
and blogger, you may want to get comment approvals. commenters, do your legal dealing in your own space. if you are owed something, keep it between yourself and the debtor.
This sounds soo good! I love anything with avocado :)
For all the haters, why don’t you just ask for your membership fee back? Oh right. This is a FREE blog. I almost forgot.
I understand testers being unhappy, and from what I read on the PKK site the Herbivore situation did sound mighty shitty. So don’t buy her book. But to complain that Lolo isn’t providing you with free content often enough is ridiculous. And let’s face is, you’ll buy the book (even secondhand) if it looks good and seems to have good recipes. If you loved Lolo but her book sucked, you wouldn’t buy it. It’s basic market economics.
Personally, I will look to buy the book secondhand just cuz I’m a cheapskate. And no matter what I feel for Lolo, I will still check this blog from time to time because it’s free and has wonderful content. The day Lolo begins charging for this site, that’s when my views will change.
This really seems yummy. Avocado, salad…I’d go for it!