Macheesmo

After a week of vacation eating mainly seafood and butter, Betsy and I were in the mood for some healthy stuff when we got home.

I wondered through the produce section and picked out a few things that looked particularly good (green beans/corn).  To make a meal out of them, I tossed them with some spicy sesame soba noodles.

Turned out to be really flavorful and one of my favorite healthy dishes in a while.

Summer Soba

by Nick

Serves:

Serves 4

Prep Time:

20 mins

Total Time:

35 mins

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Soba noodles tossed with a spicy sesame chili oil and mixed with tons of fresh summer veggies.

Ingredients

1 9.5 ounce package of soba, cooked according to package

1-2 Cups green beans

2 ears corn

1 red pepper, diced

1/2 Cup carrots, shredded

2 scallions, only greens

1-2 Tablespoons sesame oil (or chili sesame oil), for soba

2 Tablespoons vegetable oil (for cooking)

Fresh basil (garnish)

Chopped peanuts (garnish)

Sauce:

2 Tablespoons soy sauce

1 Tablespoon mirin

- 1 Serrano pepper, diced with seeds

- 2 cloves garlic, minced

- 2 inches fresh ginger, grated

Instructions

1) Prep all veggies and set them aside.

2) Cook soba according to package then drain and toss with sesame oil.

3) Mix sauce ingredients being sure to mince ginger/garlic/pepper well.

4) In a large skillet, add oil and then all the veggies except carrots and scallions.

5) Cook veggies on high heat for a few minutes until hot, but still a bit crunchy.

6) Add sauce to pan and cook for another minute or two until sauce is fragrant.

7) Add soba to pan and stir together well.  Then stir in carrots and scallions.

8) Serve with chopped basil and peanuts.

Prepping the Ingredients

The veggies that I used for this are by no means the only ones you could use.  Almost any fresh summer veggie would be great tossed in with this dish, so don’t feel limited by what I included.

Assuming you do use some of the veggies I used though, prepping them is pretty straightforward.  Dice up the red pepper, snap off the ends of the green beans and chop them in half.  Cut the corn off the cob.

In essence, this is a stir-fry recipe, so I mixed up a very quick and simple sauce for it.  Nothing too heavy, but just to give the dish some flavor.

Mince up the garlic, pepper, and ginger really finely and then stir it together with the soy sauce and mirin.

Cooking the Soba

If you aren’t familiar with soba, don’t fret.  It’s basically pasta except made with buckwheat.  This gives it a really unique flavor (almost nutty).  It also takes no time to cook.  Most soba cooks in just a few minutes.

The thing about soba is that it’s a really sticky pasta.  After you cook it and drain it, you’ll want to toss it with some oil or you’ll end up with one big block of pasta that will be pretty hard to work with.

But if you pour over a few tablespoons of sesame oil then it will flavor the pasta and also keep it from sticking.  If you want to add some heat do the dish, you can use sesame chili oil!

Finishing the Dish

Once your veggies are prepped and your pasta is cooked, this is a pretty straightforward dish to make.

Add a few tablespoons of oil to a large skillet and toss in all your veggies (except carrots and scallions) over high heat.  Cook these for just a few minutes.  You want to make sure that they still have a bit of crunch to them.

Then stir in the sauce and let it heat up and get fragrant for a minute or two.

Finally, add in all the soba and stir the whole thing together.  As a final step, stir in the carrots and scallions and you’re all set!

Serve the soba immediately with fresh basil and peanuts on top.

Very colorful and healthy dish.

One of my favorite things about soba is that unlike some other pastas, it maybe tastes even better cold.  So leftovers are perfect for a weekday lunch or something.

Summer soba was a total hit at my house.  It’s a perfect use for some of the delicious veggies available these days.