Good evening all. I hope you had a wonderful week-end.
I love Asian food. I don’t know if I ever mentioned. But with not eating anything from the Allium family, going out for Asian is completely out of the question. So over the last few years, we’ve had to become quite creative and have been trying to replicate many of our favorite recipes.
Tonight my mom asked if we could make dumplings and pot stickers for dinner, of course we said yes! There is very little that beats a 5 course dinner filled with a variety of pot stickers and dumplings, straight out of the steamer or the pan. We had Swiss chard and shiitake mushroom, spicy tofu and veggies and Indian style sweet potato. It was lovely. But we had to open it with an appetizer of some sort (the meal being made of appetizers as it was) we chose salad and I had to share my little vinaigrette with you!
Lime-Ginger Vinaigrette
- 3 TBSP olive oil
- 3 TBSP avocado oil (substitute with any light tasting oil like grape seed or sunflower)
- 2 TBSP fresh lime juice
- 1 TBSP rice vinegar
- 1 tsp to 1 TBSP fresh grated ginger (I love a LOT of ginger, but you decide)
- 1 tsp honey
- salt and pepper to taste
I just dropped everything in a small Mason jar and gave it a good shake. I always try and let my vinaigrettes sit for a few hours for the flavors to develop. So lovely and delicious. Fresh, light… perfect! We served it on iceberg lettuce, fresh bean sprouts, grated carrots and cucumbers, roasted cashew nuts, black sesame seeds and fresh curly parsley. But I’m sure you can come up with a variety of combinations. I keep thinking some sort of Asian pear and fresh pea salad next time. Mmmmm…
Have a good night everyone.
Family, Faith, Food and Fabric 
I just finished dinner and you’re still making me hungry! We eat A LOT of Asian food at our house–not so much Chinese, but the full gamut of everything else. Why no Alliums?
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Yeah, our favorite is Thai. But we tend to just get inspired and go from there so our Asian cooking would be best described as fusion. 🙂
It is part of our Tao cultivation. Garlic, onion, shallots, chives and leeks are called the 5 pungent foods. They are believed to create very strong negative Chi in the body. So to stay centered in our Buddha heart, we are thought to avoid them. 🙂 But to tell you the truth, we also highly suspect that my husband is highly intolerant to them. He used to get horrible stomach aches and cramps.
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That’s really interesting. In Anthroposphic medicine, Steiner uses the word “Etheric Body” or “Life Body,” and is essentially equivalent to Chi in Chinese medicine, as I understand it. He actually recommends Alliums during times of illness because they support the the Etheric Body in cleansing toxins by pulling them out of the body. I am always puzzling over the ways in which all these ideas fit together, and don’t. Thankful to have learned something new!
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I agree… but in Tao, there are actually 3 levels : Physical, energetic and absolute. The Allium family would be disrupting the absolute, your connection to the Universe. Chinese medicine doesn’t take away Alliums, but it is warned that any amount of it will unbalance your Chi to a point where it cannot be balanced by other foods taken together. The Tao believes it is at the root of negative emotions such as hate, lust, anger… all things we are trying to let go of. It really has nothing to do, from what I understand, to the physical. But I know other ancient medical beliefs stay away from Alliums like Ayurveda. It really is about faith at the end of the day, isn’t it… I know I feel better after years of not consuming them. Better control and knowledge of myself and my emotions. Others have seen it as well. So for me, it’s about how I feel… But I know what you mean about it’s powerful medicinal effect. It’s been highly documented.
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This is all so interesting! I read the Tao in College, but I still know so little about it. Thanks for sharing your knowledge! I am definitely going to give this some more thought.
Anthroposophic medicine views the physical heart as a reflection of the spiritual heart–not that they are simply related but they are actually one in the same, just that one carries more material density. This is true of the entire make up of the human being. So what you do to your physical heart (in this case, I think eating Alliums) directly shapes the feelings in your spiritual heart. Anyways, a lot of food for thought, pardon the pun. Thanks again!
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Thank YOU for sharing… I’ll be checking into Anthroposopnic medecine as soon as I get some time to read. Seems very interesting! 🙂
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Thanks for the recipe. I like lime salad dressing.
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Tastes like summer… 🙂
Let me know if you try it!
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That sounds delicious, will definitely have to try it, thank you.
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You are welcome… I hope you like it. 🙂
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uhmmm sounds delicious!
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It was… I rarely take down my dressing concoctions, I tend to wing them. But I had to jot down this one.
Give me news if ever you try it.
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Ooh, looks delicious!
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Thank you… write back if ever you decide to make it. I’d love to know what you paired it with!
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Yum!
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🙂 It’s really mild too so great for kiddos… xo
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