Here is another make-ahead salad to add to your summer repertoire.
This recipe is a great one for adding colour, fibre and flavour to your Yukon picnics. Make ahead since it will, like us, improve with age.
Beans – both fresh green and canned — add valuable fibre to our diets. Beans contain oligosaccharides, a complex carbohydrate that is only partially digested by humans.
Oligosaccharides sit in our gut and provide energy for healthy bacteria that reside there. While fermenting (yes, watch out for a bit of borborygmus, also known as flatulence or gas), these healthy bacteria produce important B-vitamins that help our body deal with stress.
Multi-Bean Salad
SALAD INGREDIENTS
2 cups fresh green beans, trimmed and sliced on the diagonal
2 cobs of fresh corn
1 red pepper, halved and sliced thinly
3 green onions, sliced
¾ cup fresh cilantro, snipped or coarsely chopped
1 can (540 ml) black beans, drained and rinsed
1 can (540 ml) garbanzo beans/chick peas, drained and rinsed
DRESSING INGREDIENTS
¼ cup vegetable oil
Grated zeste/rind of 1 lime
Juice of 1 lime
1 teaspoon granulated sugar
¼ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon chili powder
½ teaspoon cayenne
PREPARATION
- Boil a pot of salted water and cook the trimmed green beans for 5 minutes.
- Drain and refresh in a pot of ice water.
- Cook the corn in a pot of boiling water for 8 minutes.
- Drain and rinse.
- Set aside to cool.
- Into a large bowl, mix together the drained, cooked green beans, the sliced pepper, green onions and cilantro.
- Drain and rinse the canned beans and add to the bowl.
- In a separate bowl, whisk the dressing ingredients and add to the salad.
- Slice the corn kernels off the cooked cob in long strips.
- Gently mix in the corn trying to keep the kernel strips as long as possible.
- Refrigerate until serving.
