With the summer coming on, I’m starting to crave salads and things you can eat outdoors while soaking up the sunshine. These easy cold sesame noodles would be great to take on a picnic or just to the backyard. We love eating outside and spring is the best time to get out there, before the mosquitoes really start being prolific. Even with social distancing you can still share a nice meal in your backyard, porch, local park, balcony or even a fire escape.
How to prep this easy cold sesame noodle salad.
Jump to RecipeThese sesame noodles come together with just a little bit of vegetable prep, whipping up a dressing and cooking some pasta. Everything is tossed together and voila, cold sesame noodles. I found that the easiest way to make the dressing is in a food processor or blender but you can just as easily make it in a bowl with a whisk.
First, any kind of long noodle would work for this. I just used spaghetti since that’s what I had in my pantry. Spaghetti, linguine, Chinese wheat noodles, soba, rice noodles or even ramen noodles would do! To start, I put a large pot of water on to boil. As the water is boiling, I prep the broccoli and dressing ingredients. As soon as the water is boiling, add the broccoli to quickly blanch.
Once I fish them out, I use the same pot of water to boil my pasta. One pot and done! As the pasta cooks, the rest of the vegetables are prepped and the dressing is mixed! I love recipes like this where I can do most of my prepping while active cooking is going on. To plate, you can either just mix everything together in one bowl and toss with the dressing or dress the noodles and add the vegetables and garnishes on top. A little extra dressing drizzled over everything is nice if you plate it this way.
Easy swaps for different diet needs.
This noodle salad is a great way to get everyone to eat their veggies. You can increase the vegetables and reduce the amount of noodles if you like. Rice noodles, tofu shirataki noodles, 100% buckwheat soba or wheat free pasta would make this gluten free. Swap out the peanut butter for sunflower butter (or use all tahini) to make it nut free. To add more greens, massaged kale, baby spinach and herbs like cilantro, mint or parsley would be a great. Change out the raw veggies for things like cucumber, shredded cabbage or snow peas. If you don’t have sesame seeds, chopped peanuts or cashews would be nice for garnishing.
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Easy Cold Sesame Noodles
Ingredients
For the Dressing (makes 1½ cups)
- 2 cloves garlic, peeled
- 2 inch piece of ginger, peeled and roughly chopped
- 2-3 tablespoons honey or maple syrup
- 2 tablespoons toasted sesame oil
- ¼ cup tahini, well-stirred
- ⅓ cup peanut butter, natural style preferred
- ⅓ cup soy sauce
- ½ cup rice vinegar (or apple cider vinegar)
- 1-2 tablespoons sriracha, sambal or your favorite hot sauce, or to taste (optional)
For the Noodle Salad
- 4 cups (230g) broccoli florets
- 1 red, orange or yellow bell pepper, seeded, cut into thin slices
- 2 large carrots, peeled and julienned (or grated)
- 3 scallions, thinly sliced (reserve some scallion greens to garnish at the end)
- 1 pound spaghetti, linguine, chinese noodles or soba noodles
- 2 tablespoons white and/or black sesame seeds (reserve a small amount to garnish at the end)
- roasted peanuts or cashews, chopped, for garnish (optional)
Method
- Put a large pot of water over high heat to boil. In a food processor or blender, combine all the ingredients for the dressing. Blend until smooth. (Taste dressing, adjusting acid, saltiness or sweetness as desired.) If dressing is too thick (it should be a thin, pourable texture), add 1-2 tablespoons of water and blend again.
- Salt the boiling water with a few, large pinches of salt. Add the broccoli and cook for 2-3 minutes until crisp-tender. Remove broccoli with a slotted spoon or spider into a bowl. Place in colander and rinse under cold water to stop the cooking. Leave to drain in the colander.
- In the same pot of boiling water, cook noodles according to package instructions. Drain. Combine noodles, broccoli, carrots, bell peppers, scallions and sesame seeds in a large mixing bowl. Dress with 3/4 of the dressing and toss well to combine. If noodles need more dressing, add more. Otherwise, reserve extra dressing to re-dress leftovers or another use.
- Place noodle salad on a serving platter or bowl. Garnish with reserved scallions and sesame seeds, chopped peanuts or cashews, as desired.
Notes
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This looks delicious! I’m always looking for new vegan recipes to add to my rotation. I’ll definitely give it a try!
These noodles look so yummy and refreshing!
This is a great lunch option! Thanks for sharing!
This recipe looks delicious for lunch this summer! I’ll be trying it!!
This looks so light and refreshing! We’re finally hitting 90 degrees here in Maine, so this salad would make a perfect dinner!!
There is definately a lot to find out about this topic. I really like all of the points you have made. Sadie Klement Ewan
Thank you! I’m glad you found this useful! Cheers!