I love the mix of soba noodles and vegetable noodles in this salad. The soba noodles are filling and if you use the buckwheat variety, some what nutty, the xoodles are tender and fresh and the carrot noodles (coodles?! nope, probably not) keep their crunchy. They’re all then dressed in the delicious creamy dressing and finished off with more vegetables and that vibrant pesto. Yum.

You could serve this as a warm or cold salad, but if your planning on reheating maybe keep the zucchini noodles separate until after you’ve reheated the rest as they tend to turn to mush when they get over cooked. The residual heat of everything else will warm them up enough.

This noodle salad is perfect for lunch as it can all be prepped the day before hand, makes heaps and the flavour just continues to develop as it sits together. A boiled egg would be an excellent addition to this salad if you;re worried about staying full without having meat in your lunch.

You do not have to cook the mushrooms if you prefer them raw. I do think that steaming them whole like this gives them just the right amount of tenderness that they soak up the flavours of the dressing and pesto but aren’t too slippery.

The pesto makes more than you need, but you can also use it on this salad or on any grilled meat you like. It’s even good on avocado toast.

Ingredients

250g soba buckwheat noodles

2 carrots, spriralized

2 zucchini, spiralized

button mushrooms

sweet capsicums (I used a medley of the small ones in yellow, red and orange but any would work)

1/4 cup Spring onion

1/ cup coriander leaves

Dressing

1/2 cup coconut cream

1 Tbs Soy sauce

1 heaped tsp freshly grated ginger

2 tsp tumeric

1 tsp garam masala

1/2 green chilli

juice and zest of 1 lime

1/2 cup (loosely packed) roughly chopped spring onion

Coriander and peanut pesto

2 cups coriander leaves, firmly packed (this should be 1 large bunch of coriander, leaves stalks and a couple of the well washed roots. )

1/2 cup roasted, unsalted, peanuts

1.5 tsp soy sauce

1/3 cup olive oil (a lightly flavoured one will be best)

1/2 tsp sesame oil

1/2 tsp fish sauce

1 tsp black vinegar or rice wine vinegar could work

juice and zest of one lime

1 spring onion, roughly chopped

1/2 a hot red chilli (or a whole mild one)

1 tsp freshly grated ginger

1 small clove of garlic, crushed

Directions

Cook noodles according to packet directions, rinse under cold water. Combine these with the spiralised carrot and zucchini, toss until well combined.

Dressing: Place all dressing ingredients in a blender or food processor and blitz until well combined. Pour over the noodles and mix well until the dressing is evenly dispersed among the noodles.

Steam the mushrooms whole for 3 minutes, or until just tender. Use a paper towel of clean tea towel to dry them, removing any residual dirt. Then slice thinly.

Very finely slice the capsicum, combine this and the mushrooms with the noodles and mix together until evenly dispersed.

Pesto: combine all ingredients in a blender or food processor, process until well combined and starting to look slightly creamy.

Serve with the coriander pesto drizzled over the salad and the spring onion and coriander leaves sprinkled over top.

HH. x