I’ve been stressing out about the lack of ‘dark leafy greens’ in our diet here in Mexico. The vegetables here that look the best are avocados and limes…consistently. Anything else is hit and miss. So you can imagine my delight when Ivan woke me this morning with a bunch of leafy greens that he’d found on his morning walk with Mika. Yeah, not your usual thing to be delighted by upon waking, but these are not usual circumstances.
Naturally I was stoked. I wasn’t going to risk them going bad in this crazy heat, so I decided to use them up for lunch, pronto. After a bit of searching around for inspiration, I used what we had and came up with this. Perfectly spicy, crunchy, fresh and warm. I suppose you could call this a salad. I’m not sure what the technical term for salad is, but this definitely isn’t a stew or a soup, so salad will do.
You could really use any combination of greens and vegetables in this. I feel like some big juicy mushrooms would be amazing, as would some dry roasted chopped peanuts or some mung beans. You could also use spinach or kale instead of whatever it was that we used (I think it was silverbeet of some kind).
Spicy Buckwheat + Garlicky Greens
- Buckwheat soba noodles, cooked according to the package
- Large bunch of dark greens (I have no idea what ours were called. Something from the silverbeet family maybe)
- 3 cloves of garlic, chopped tiny
- Block of tofu (we can only get Silken here, but firm would be nicer probably)
- Bunch of asparagus, blanched to perfection
- 2 handfuls of cherry tomatoes, halved
- Half a large cucumber, peeled and sliced/chopped
- 1/4 cup of chopped cilantro
For the dressing, mix the following together vigorously:
- 2 tbsp tahini
- juice of a lemon
- pinch of salt
- 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
- 3 tbsp warm water
So to cook the greens, wash the leaves and shake them dry in a colander. Heat up some water in a pan (like about 1cm of water). When it’s boiling, throw the greens in and toss around until they have all wilted down (about 1 minute). Remove and squeeze moisture from them and chop up small on a chopping board.
Now reheat the pan and add a tiny splash of oil. Throw in the garlic and stir so it doesn’t brown. Add the chopped spinach and mix it all around til it’s nice and cooked and garlicky. You can throw the tofu in the pan now too – mix it all together til it’s hot and good.
In a large bowl, combine the cooked buckwheat noodles, the garlicky greens with the tofu, the cherry tomatoes, the cucumber, the cilantro and the blanched asparagus.
Pour the dressing overtop and mix it up!
We served some to baby before the dressing was added. We added more cayenne pepper on our own plates and it was amazing. I’d love to know if you try this!
