My go-to dish when it’s “too hot to cook” is this Vietnamese-style noodle salad. It uses leftover grilled meat or shrimp to excellent effect and is brimming with flavor.
| Prep Time: | 25 mins |
| Additional Time: | 5 mins |
| Total Time: | 30 mins |
| Servings: | 4 |
| Yield: | 4 servings |
Ingredients
- ¼ cup water, or more to taste
- 3 tablespoons lime juice
- 3 tablespoons fish sauce
- 3 tablespoons brown sugar, or more to taste
- 1 clove garlic, minced
- 1 teaspoon minced fresh ginger root
- ½ teaspoon Sriracha chile sauce
- 1 (8 ounce) package (linguine-width) rice noodles
- 2 cups thinly sliced Napa (Chinese) cabbage
- 1 ½ cups matchstick-cut carrots
- 8 ounces grilled shrimp
- 1 cup bean sprouts
- ½ English cucumber, halved lengthwise and cut into thin slices
- 2 green onions, thinly sliced
- 2 ⅔ tablespoons chopped fresh mint
- 2 ⅔ tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro
- 2 ⅔ tablespoons chopped fresh basil
- ½ cup coarsely chopped peanuts
Instructions
- Whisk water, lime juice, fish sauce, brown sugar, garlic, ginger, and Sriracha together in a bowl until the sugar is dissolved.
- Bring a large pot of water to a full boil; remove from heat and soak rice noodles in the hot water for 1 minute. Stir to separate the noodles and continue soaking until the noodles are tender, about 3 minutes more. Drain noodles and rinse with cold water until cooled. Shake noodles in colander to drain as much water as possible.
- Mix noodles, cabbage, carrots, shrimp, bean sprouts, cucumber slices, green onions, mint, cilantro, and basil together in a large bowl. Drizzle the dressing over the salad and toss to coat. Top with chopped peanuts.
- Dressing can be made ahead and refrigerated for up to 5 days.
- You can use sambal oelek chile pepper sauce or red pepper flakes in place of Sriracha, if that better fits your tastes.
- Any leftover grilled meat works well in this salad: shrimp, pork, or chicken are all great options.
- The salad is very flexible; try adding julienned red or yellow pepper, pea pods, baby bok choy, or substitute sliced romaine lettuce for the cabbage.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 450 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 71 g |
| Cholesterol | 109 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 5 g |
| Protein | 20 g |
| Saturated Fat | 2 g |
| Sodium | 1265 mg |
| Sugars | 16 g |
| Fat | 10 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
used half water; half sesame oil
made it exactly like the recipe. Yum!!
Definitely a do over! The flavors blended nicely and my picky eater had seconds. I did omit the water from the sauce as suggested, and also added a few drops of oil to make it cling to the noodles better. Next time I might add a little more lime for a better tang, but it was fine without it.
Great dish, made some changes to fit our tastes and what was available. Next time will try with mint instead of Italian parsley. Wish the dressing would coat the noodles and cabbage more, but otherwise a nice fresh summer meal.
i really love it
A new favorite! I let the noodles soak in the dressing while I put everything else together so they would pick up a little extra flavor and to keep them from sticking. Didn’t make a lot of adjustments besides lowering the sugar 50%. Might add more sriracha next time.
The zesty lime adds a delightful tanginess to the dressing. Personally, I would have preferred a more substantial dressing that could thoroughly coat the salad and noodles. Unfortunately, the dressing turned out quite watery and simply sank to the bottom of the plate. Additionally, I mistakenly used fettucine instead of linguini, resulting in slightly thicker noodles than intended. This might explain why it seemed like there was an excessive amount of noodles compared to the salad. To enhance the spiciness, I adjusted the dressing by adding more Sriracha after tasting it. To simplify my evening meal and minimize clean-up, I completed all the preparations in the morning. I marinated and grilled the shrimp, then stored them in the refrigerator. I also made the dressing and chopped and sliced all the vegetables, keeping everything in the fridge until dinner time. Just before serving, I effortlessly assembled the salad. Remember, it’s best not to add the dressing until you’re ready to eat, as it could make the salad soggy. While this recipe required a substantial number of ingredients and involved a fair amount of chopping and slicing, it wasn’t my favorite Asian noodle salad recipe on this website, although we did enjoy it.
Delicious, delightfully light salad. I did modify the dressing, eliminated the water, upped the other ingredients slightly to compensate. I think the trick with the complaint about the dressing being too light has to do with the added water, also let the salad marinate in the dressing for a bit, tossing every 5-10 minutes for about 30 minutes total. This is going to be a summer staple for me!
This is different. It’s a cold salad chocked full of vegetables. I used some cabbage, spinach and lettuce,
Delicious! For our palates could take more lime (or less water) and more Siracha!But this will be a family and friend dish!!
This “Saigon Noodle Salad” turned out great! I subbed a tiny amount of palm sugar for the specified brown sugar, and added some VIRGIN COLD-PRESSED (flavorful) peanut oil to the dressing (probably not authentic Thai: I get that from the Chinese store). I wish I had of thought to make the dressing in advance as I had four bowls soaking taking up a lot of space: the fresh herbs from the Farmer’s Market to clean and “freshen” them (3 bowls); and beans sprouts in water and vinegar to get the “earthy flavor” off them (1 bowl). Thank you AnnInLondon for sharing your recipe. UPDATE: The dressing on the noodles becomes more delicious with time. I might be inclined to make the “noodle and dressing” part of the salad in advance next time.
Pretty good! I used chili flakes instead of sriracha. I will probably use rice vinegar next time, instead of lime juice, and likely will cut back the sugar. I used some leftover grilled chicken that had been marinated in yogurt and cumin, worked fine. I wasn’t a big fan of the mint and will likely leave that out next time.
Made nearly as written (didn’t have fish sauce or sriracha), subbed Worcestershire and soy sauce and used habanero sauce and red pepper flakes instead. We really liked the lightness of the salad, a good one for a hot summer day. Also, eating clean and light helps avoid that terrible feeling of overeating after a meal. Now, where’s that pie?
Excellent recipe except for the added sugar! It is not necessary. If you want, you can use 1 teaspoon of honey instead.
I followed the recipe as written. I really liked the herbs mixed in with the cabbage and carrots. The dressing did have flavor, but could have maybe stuck to the greens and noodles better, or maybe a little stronger flavor or something. It kind of lacked in that department. I’ll definitely try this recipe again, but with some tweaks.
A lot of fuss which I don’t normally mind but found that the meal ended up being rather ordinary.
Very good. I used olive oil in place of water in the dressing; bagged coleslaw mix in place of Napa cabbage, cooked pork tenderloin in place of shrimp, regular cucumber in place of English cucumber, and cashews in place of peanuts in the salad. I initially rated four stars…but given that I didn’t have any of the fresh herbs…and subbed the veggies…I’m sure that this salad would easily be five stars with fresh herbs and the specified veggies. Notes…#1 Follow the directions on the box for cooking the noodles. #2 As I’m cooking for one and knew I wud have leftovers, I sprinkled the noodles, and the pork, with the dressing before assembling my salad at dinnertime and putting the leftover of both into the fridge for the next night, so I did make more dressing the next night. #3 I mixed the full amount of carrots and cabbage for my leftovers, but added the green onions and cucumbers at serving #4 I’ll prolly increase the green onion next time…and might put a layer of salad greens or just plain iceberg under. Thank you for sharing your wonderful recipe! PS: Also didn’t use bean sprouts…haven’t been available around here, at least not on a regular basis, since the contamination scare a few years ago.
This was excellent! Great combination of ingredients and flavors. I used close to a Tablespoon of ginger but only because I love it and used 4 Tablespoons of cilantro and basil each but left out the mint. This is a great salad and is ideal to make with leftover grilled proteins. Can’t wait to try this next with leftover grilled Salmon and leftover grilled chicken. Thanks Ann for sharing your recipe, it’s wonderful!
Very good salad! ….. would be more flavorful if sauce was doubled.
This recipe was fantastic! The flavors were amazing.
My husband gave this salad five stars … And he is not an easy grader! The rice noodles could have been cooked a little more. I left out the bean sprouts and used a regular cucumber. Full of flavor. I sautéed medium sized thawed frozen shrimp instead of grilling. I had someone ask for the recipe which is always a good sign.