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Fresh, crunchy and with a tantalizing sweet and sour flavour, the Japanese Sunomono Salad is a perfect dish to prepare in the summer!
The Sunomono is a cucumber and wakame seaweed salad, dressed with rice vinegar, sugar and sesame seeds, making it perfect for vegans and vegetarians too. If you want, however, you can customize it by enriching it with other ingredients, usually from the sea.
I wanted to add some octopus and a drop of soy sauce and granular Dashi broth in the dressing to make it even more delicious.
The Sunomono Salad can be eaten alone or as in the Japanese tradition, as an accompaniment along with white rice, grilled fish and Miso Soup.
What is Sunomono
The term sunomono refers to all foods / dishes that have been seasoned with vinegar. The most famous is the Sunomono Salad.
How to Make Japanese Sunomono Salad
To prepare a great sunomono salad, you need to choose the right cucumbers! For this dish, and in general for all oriental dishes, which involve cucumbers, if you don’t find Japanese ones, use English or Persian cucumbers. You recognize them because they have a finer skin, are thinner and longer, and above all less watery.
At the time of preparation, with a teaspoon remove the part of the seeds and sprinkle them with salt, put them in a strainer and make sure that they lose the excess water. In this way, the salad will not be watery and the cucumbers will remain crunchy.
The other ingredients are just as easy to find, rice vinegar, wakame seaweed and sesame seeds. This combination is the basic Sunomono salad, but you can make it more delicious and complete by adding other ingredients, in this case the salad is called “Tako Sunomono“, (Tako means octopus). But other variations can be created, the most common are:
- Ebi Sunomono (Sunomono with Shrimps)
- Surimi Sunomono
- Kani Sunomono (Sunomono with Crab)
- Edamame Sunomone (another version suitable for vegans and vegetarians)
There is also the variant with chicken, boil it plain or in dashi broth and once cold, shred it before adding it to the salad.
Sunomono Salad With Octopus
Ingredienti
- 2 Cucumbers Japanese, English or Persian
- ½ tsp Salt
- 1 Tbsp of Wakame Seaweed
- ½ Tbsp of White Sesame Seeds
Optional
- 400 g Octopus cooked
Seasoning
- 4 Tbsp of Rice Vinegar
- 2 Tbsp of Caster Sugar
- ½ tsp Salt
Optional
- ½ tsp Soy Sauce
- ¼ tsp Dashi Broth granulated
Variations
- 400 g Crabmeat 1 can
- 200 g Surimi
- 200 g Edamame boiled
- 200 g Prawns boiled
Preparazione
Seasoning
- In a bowl, mix the vinegar, sugar, and salt. If you want to enrich the sauce, also add ½ tsp of soy sauce and ¼ tsp of granular Dashi broth. If the flavor is too strong you can add 1 tsp of water.4 Tbsp of Rice Vinegar, 2 Tbsp of Caster Sugar, ½ tsp Salt, ½ tsp Soy Sauce, ¼ tsp Dashi Broth
- Stir until sugar, salt and any Dashi are dissolved, add White Sesame Seeds and keep in the fridge.½ Tbsp of White Sesame Seeds
Salad
- In a bowl with cold water, soak 1 tbs of wakame seaweed to rehydrate.1 Tbsp of Wakame Seaweed
- Wash the 2 cucumbers and remove the ends.Peel them alternating a strip of peel and one without, then slice them thinly.2 Cucumbers
- Sprinkle them with salt and mix well, let them rest for 5 minutes in a strainer, so that the cucumbers lose their liquid.½ tsp Salt
- Drain and squeeze the rehydrated Wakame seaweed and cut it lightly.
- *If you add the octopus, cut it into thin slices.
- Also squeeze the cucumbers and put them in a bowl, add the seaweed, octopus, season and mix well.400 g Octopus, 1 Tbsp of Wakame Seaweed
- Serve in a bowl or single portions, as you like.
To Preserve
- It keeps well in the fridge for 2/4 days, also take into account the fish ingredients that could spoil earlier.
Note
There is also the variant with chicken, boil it and, once cold, shred it before adding it to the salad.
Nutrienti
Le informazioni nutrizionali sono una stima fornita da un calcolatore nutrizionale online. Non devono essere considerate un sostituto del consiglio di un nutrizionista professionista.