Food lies at the heart of our bodies and our culture; it is there for celebrations and sustenance. NOMaste features a local fierce foodie each month, in four weekly segments. First, an interview, then a top 10 list, followed by a recipe to share, and finally a food review. This food corner will not just feature local chefs but also restaurateurs, buyers, suppliers — any woman involved in any aspect of the food chain, from farm to food truck. Join us each week as we get to know another Foodie in the city. Part I of this month’s series can be found here, and part II can be found here.
Mango Salad
Dressing
1 T fish sauce
1 T lime juice
1 T sugar
Chili (up to you)
Salad
¼ C diced red onion
½ T chopped cilantro
½ T sliced scallions
Semi-ripe Mango (it’s sweeter this way), cut up in strips
Mix together all the dressing ingredients. Then, cut up all the salad ingredients. Toss everything together and enjoy!
This recipe has to be one of THE easiest I have ever attempted — and one of the most rewarding. The end result is a super sweet, tangy, and spicy salad. Perfect for a hot summer day. I can imagine taking it out of the fridge where it had a chance to cool and meld together for a few hours and having this delicious concoction on my hammock in the shade in the back.
The brand of fish sauce Rin recommends is Squid brand, but you could use any that you like. Add the pepper flakes to taste. I did not have pepper flakes, so I made my own from a ground up dried chili pepper. I only ground up ONE, and did not add all of it and it still ended up being way hotter than I was expecting. My mouth is still tingling!
The cilantro gives it that extra special snap of flavor that is unexpected, while the scallions and red onions give it that bite that only raw onions can give.
I recall the salad at Rin’s restaurant had some fried onions on top — which would be a great ingredient to add for the extra mouthfeel. You could also add anything else you like, such as cucumbers or tomatoes — but I was more than satisfied with this basic version.
Play with it and adjust the spice to your levels (or with any other levels! Perhaps you want more lime juice to fish sauce ratio — that’s fine, too!). Take this and make it yours by tweaking it, but this is an essential building block to building a great dinner.