Thursday, August 5, 2010

Szechuan Black Eyed Pea Salad

I’ve been seeing several delicious-looking recipes for bean salads lately. I love cold bean salads, probably more than I should. During the summer, it’s especially satisfying to have a cool and filling meal of dressed up chilled beans. I’ve been dreaming about the Black and White Bean Salad I made a while back and I will be making that again soon with my wealth of cannellini beans (I froze some).

This is a recipe I snipped out of Vegetarian Times around last Thanksgiving. I finally made it. I’d forgotten about the snippet and recently uncovered it in a pile of papers. This was just as delicious as I thought it would be: black eyed peas and avocado – genius combination!

018 Salad made with black eyed peas, green bell pepper, red onion, and avocado, dressed with lime, red wine vinegar, and Szechwan sauce.

The only change I made to the recipe was using frozen peas rather than canned. As much as I love black eyed peas and their smoother sister, purple hull peas, I haven’t eaten them from a can. For so long I’d only had them one way: boiled, and usually served with rice and salsa or tomato pickle. That’s still probably my favorite way to eat them, but a close runner-up is the Vietnamese dessert where black eyed peas are served over sticky rice with coconut milk. And this salad is right up there, too. I’m ready to start playing around with this little bean: how about a creamy dip next?

7 comments:

  1. Yeah, the bean/avocado combo looks great! I love the taste of cold beans :]

    Honestly there really aren't many participating restaurants that are veg-friendly except probably the Thai and Indian ones (and even those are a bit questionable sometimes). I've actually eaten two lunches during Restaurant Week before--once at a 4 star French restaurant and another time at a Japanese/pan-Asian joint. At the FRENCH restaurant, I ended up paying $24 for crappy appetizers and cheese RAVIOLI entree (which they sent as per my special request for a vegetarian option since everything was meat-centric), and the same amount for a cheap egg and frozen veggie fried rice entree at the Japanese place. Serious disappointment. I totally agree with you--I NEVER spend that much on a normal basis, yet I'm paying this ridiculous amount for bad food! Sigh sigh sigh.

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  2. Looks awesome!!! I love black beans and this looks so so so perfect for summer!

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  3. I love black eyed peas. When I first heard of a cold bean salad, I thought..."YUCK". But, a couple of weeks ago I tried it for the first time and found that I really liked it. Yours looks delish!

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  4. I like the retro serving cups as well. Retro cups for a somewhat retro bean.

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  5. Black-eyed peas and avocado sounds like a great combo...I need to eat black-eyed peas more often...all the dishes you describe sound interesting.

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  6. I've never had black eyed peas but that salad looks great. And yes please make a dip next!

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  7. thanks for saying hi today :) and your veggie bowl looks awesome!

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