Thursday, 1 May 2014

Bountiful Brown Rice Salad Bowl with Melissa's Homemade Sriracha Sauce

Rocket & Roses HQ Play List:

Jamie Cullum ~ But For Now
Beware of Darkness ~ Sweet Girl
Buckcherry ~ Lit Up
Joan Jett ~ We're All Crazy Now
Anna Nalick ~ Drink Me (early demo)
Bonnie Raitt ~ Used To Rule The World
Artful Dodger ~ Twentyfourseven (Radio version)
Beyonce ~ Green Light
Brad Paisley ~ She's Everything
Audioslave ~ Sound Of A Gun
Pearl Jam ~ Jeremy
Brandi Carlile ~ Rise Again
The Union ~ Fading Out Of Love
Gin Wigmore ~ Happy Ever After

More often than not the best recipe creations are the ones you just throw together at the last minute. I made this salad for lunch yesterday. My Mum was here for her regular Wednesday afternoon visit and as quickly as I could chop the fresh veggies she was pinching them...like a Pick n Mix stand. lol. I don't mind as this recipe makes enough for 4 servings. I used brown rice as my starter base but you could use any cold cooked grain or seed. There was no thought to the selection of veggies used...I just grabbed what I could and chopped and threw them in. The star of this salad was the Sriracha Sauce I added at the end. Last week I found a recipe by Melissa over at mywholefoodlife.com and after a particularly horrid hospital appt I came home and boy did I take it out on my mountain of chillies...lol. Kitchen work is my therapy...always has been and that day I was grateful to have this recipe to test out and for Melissa's original recipe and posting about this sauce simply click here...

Now my only experience of Sriracha Sauce has been the standard bottled variety and to be honest I wasn't that taken with it. I was a great fan of sweet chilli sauce at that point so I found Sriracha just...well..hot. But since eliminating all refined sugars and most other forms too I've lost my taste for Sweet Chilli Sauce so I thought maybe now I would appreciate Sriracha (I just wish I could actually pronounce it...lol) Sauce but when I scanned the contents list on my shop bought bottle I was horrified by the ingredients. I have to admit that bottle went straight into the bin and I searched out a homemade recipe and that is how I found Melissa's recipe. I did have to make two minor changes...you cannot buy Fresno chillies here so had to use the regular reds you can buy in almost all supermarkets. Also Habanero chillies are hard to find so I swapped them out for Scotch Bonnet chillies. The one major change I made was using apple cyder vinegar instead of the white vinegar because apple is the only vinegar I can eat now. And although I was tempted to try using Stevia in this recipe I caved in and bought a bag of coconut sugar and I am happy to report it hasn't made me sick so phew..lol..but it was such a small amount I was hopeful my system could tolerate it. 

The sauce is nothing like the bottle processed kind although you could blitz it until it's smooth if that's your wish. I like that it's quite thick but would happily blitz some down if I wanted to make a Sriracha drizzle for a recipe. I enjoy this sauce...it has some heat, a warming heat as opposed to hot heat. It is very slightly sweet but that is maybe the difference between using white vinegar and apply cyder vinegar. I would also reduce the coconut sugar next time too...take it down to maybe 1/2 tbsp. Overall this sauce is great and stored in a glass jar in the fridge Melissa says it will keep good for a couple of months which makes it an economical homemade alternative to the store bought kind.

Bountiful Brown Rice Salad Bowl with Melissa's Homemade Sriracha Sauce

Bountiful Brown Rice Salad Bowl    Serves 4 

90g cooked brown rice, cooled 
1 med carrot, peeled and finely diced
2 celery stalks, trimmed and finely diced
6 red radish, trimmed and finely diced
handful mooli/diakon noodles, slightly chopped
1 large red bell pepper, chopped
15 mange'tout, trimmed and chopped
7oz cooked green lentils, cooled 

Peel, chop and trim all veggies and place into a large serving bowl with the brown rice and lentils and toss to distribute and you have your salad bowl. 


Melissa's Homemade Sriracha Sauce

 Melissa's Homemade Sriracha Sauce  Makes 2 cups
(Recipe from mywholefoodlife.com)

1lb red Fresno peppers
2 Habanero peppers
2 tbsp minced garlic
1/4 cup white vinegar 
1 tbsp coconut sugar
1/2 tsp salt

Cut the peppers and mince the garlic. Add all the ingredients to a processor and pulse until everything is mostly broken down. 

Add the processed mixture to a saute pan and cook on high for about 5 minutes stirring constantly.  Remove from the heat and let the mixture cool. 

Transfer the mixture to a jar and store in the fridge.  This sauce should keep in the fridge for a couple of months. You can also freeze it for longer storage. 

Enjoy! 

Thanks for stopping by and I hope your Thursday is a great one..

~Red~

NB: The Sriracha sauce recipe is not mine and therefore I take no credit for it whatsoever. It is the hard work and creation of Melissa @ mywholefoodlife.com and hers alone. I thank her for a great recipe. ~R~