Burmese Baby Bok Choy Salad

Your past experience, may be even your common sense, will tell you that bok choys are meant to be boiled, stir-fried or grilled. What if I tell you to fight those biases? Why, you ask? I am here to tell you that one of the best ways to enjoy bok choys is to actually eat them raw. I know this fleshy bonsai-looking vegetable does not look like something that will win the America’s Next Top Salad Green. But, trust me when I say that its seemingly fibrous stem is actually quite tender, juicy and crunchy. Moreover, I absolutely adore raw baby bok choys’ sweet pepperiness, reminiscent of a milder and a more palatable cousin called watercress. The last but definitely not least, compared to lettuce, bok choys hold up their shape so much better after being tossed in salad dressing, making them a wiser choice for packed lunches.

The dressing I used in this salad is a classic Burmese dressing. I wouldn’t blame you if you think the dressing ingredients – dried shrimp powder, fish sauce chickpea flour, lime, garlic oil and crushed cashews – are quite peculiar. But I have to stress that everything has a purpose. Dried shrimp powder adds intense savory or umami flavor, while also acting as a thickener.  Fish sauce amplifies that umami flavor. Toasted chickpea flour sounds a bit out of place, but it is essential to give the cohesive glue that binds the whole salad together. As a result, instead of greens swimming in watery dressing, you ended up with lip-smacking savory salad. Lastly, I cannot stress enough the importance of crushed cashews – traditionally, we use peanuts, but I used cashews here to boost the sweetness of the dish. Crushed cashews add both textural contrast and fatty unctuousness so needed in this peppery and spiky salad.

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A few years back, Huffington post (link: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/01/14/burmese-salads-thoke-recipes_n_6462854.html ) has hailed Burmese salads. But, of course, real devotees or people who have tried Burmese salads before do not need the words of outside cooperation to believe it.

For a full recipe, please visit Jade Asian Green Website.

This post is sponsored by San Miguel Produce, but anything I said, wrote or thought about is the sole output of my own free will.

San Miguel Produce is an innovative, sustainable family farm passionately focused on growing and processing quality, nutrient-dense greens. As the grower, processor and shipper, the company can provide consumers with the very best greens that are Farm Fresh, Grower Direct. All our greens are proudly grown in the USA year-round in Oxnard in Southern California.

Jade is an authentic Asian greens line of San Miguel’s brands. The first washed, ready-to-use, fresh Asian greens on the market, starting in 2008.  

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