Rice Noodle Salad with Crispy Tofu

This light and bright Rice Noodle Salad with Crispy Tofu is perfect as a lunch or dinner. It is packed full of flavour as well as plenty of veggies and protein from the crispy tofu. Get the recipe below.

Rice noodle salads

Rice noodles are a common feature of Asian cooking and you'll often find rice noodle salads in Vietnam. But what exactly are they?

What are rice noodles?

Rice noodles are a type of noodle made up of rice flour and water (although they may sometimes also include cornflour or tapioca flour).

Because they are made from rice flour they are gluten free.

I love using rice noodles as they have a wonderful chewy texture and are great at soaking up sauces. They taste great in a cold salad like this Rice Noodle Salad with Crispy Tofu or in a stir fry.

How do you cook rice noodles?

It's incredibly easy to cook rice noodles as they just need re-hydrating. Add them to a pan of water, bring to a simmer then leave them to sit in the hot water. They will soak up the hot water and become softer.

Once cooked remove from the pan and drain. You can run them under cold water to cool them down quickly for this salad. If you're adding to a stir fry chuck them in at the last minute.

Salad vegetables

You can add a whole range of vegetables to this simple salad. In this particular recipe I've used:

• spring onions
• cucumber
• carrot
• red cabbage

You may want to consider adding other vegetables like red or yellow peppers.

The key to adding veggies to this salad is to cut them really finely, like matchsticks (julienne) or to have them peeled into ribbons.

How to julienne vegetables

There are three ways you can julienne your vegetables.

1. By hand
2. Using a julienne peeler
3. Using a mandolin with a julienne attachment

By hand is by far the most cumbersome.

To julienne a cucumber you need to trim them and then cut them into slices roughly 2-4mm thick. You then stack these slices on top of one another and then cut into matchsticks.

For the red cabbage you can just thinly slice this.

How to create carrot ribbons

To peel the carrots just run your peeler down the length of the carrot repeating until you have used the whole carrot. This is easiest with a Y shaped peeler.

How to cook crispy tofu

Like rice noodles, tofu is also commonly found in Asian cuisine and is a great source of protein.

To get crispy tofu you have two choices - fry or bake.

I like to reduce the amount of oil used in a salad so choose to bake the tofu in this particular recipe.

First off you need a block of firm/extra firm tofu. Squeeze out any excess water then cut into cubes. Place onto a lined baking tray then toss in just a little oil or use an oil spray to just coat the cubes. Season with a little salt and pepper.

Bake in a hot oven for 25-30 minutes and you'll have perfectly crispy pieces of tofu.

You can add these to the salad hot or cold but I prefer cold.

Adding flavour

To season the salad I've made a simple dressing from soy sauce and lime juice and then sprinkled coriander over the top.

For an extra kick you can also add thinly slice red chilli.

The recipe

We've talked about the key components of the dish so now it's time to make the recipe! Here we go...

More vegan Asian inspired dishes

Enjoy!