Wednesday, April 22, 2009

We Fava-red This Version

Because the fava beans I painstakingly shelled and steamed reminded me of edamame, I thought perhaps a little Asian twist would perk up their mild flavor without drowning it. I was dreaming of ginger and shoyu and such.

In the fridge I found an avocado, some fresh bright orange carrots, a single tangerine and some bacon left over from my BLT at Barney's. With some green onion and rice vinegar, all that seemed like a fun combination for my second fava salad attempt.

I took the zest off the tangerine before sectioning it for the salad and kept the zest to add to the dressing. To the zest, I added sliced green onion, the shoyu, rice wine vinegar, grated fresh ginger and a dollop of Dijon mustard, mixed it all together and drizzled it very lightly over the avocado slices, tangerine sections, fava beans, carrot slices and bacon bits.

It was a beautiful salad with fresh bright colors and tangy, lively dressing. The creamy avocado was great with the tangerine, the crunch of the carrot and bacon bits. Once again, I felt that the delicate favas were a little out of their league with these big flavors but they did add a pretty note of green and, because I used only a light drizzle of dressing, there was an occasional hint of fresh fava flavor peeking through from bite to bite.

We favored this version strongly over the previous one - this one, we'd even make again!

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6 Comments:

Blogger Chilebrown said...

What I like about fava's is the subtle taste. Olive oil, garlic and salt is all I need.

Left over bacon? What is that?

Wednesday, April 22, 2009  
Blogger Zoomie said...

Chilebrown, I agree that less is more with favas. Delicious!

Thursday, April 23, 2009  
Blogger cookiecrumb said...

What a pretty salad. Gorgeous.
I will confess, favas have failed to captivate me. A lot of trouble.

Thursday, April 23, 2009  
Blogger Zoomie said...

Cookiecrumb, I was particularly pleased with the color combo, except I wish I'd had some fresh violas in my garden to add the punch of purple.

Thursday, April 23, 2009  
Blogger cookiecrumb said...

Violas... that's Johnny Jump-Ups, right?
Right now I have a LOT of purple flowering seed tops on rampant chives... That might be good (but not as pretty).

Thursday, April 23, 2009  
Blogger Zoomie said...

Cookiecrumb, my grandmother called them Johnny Jump-ups, too - and yes, violas are the same. I think your light purple allium flowers would have been pretty,too.

Thursday, April 23, 2009  

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