Wake Up Your Mouth Thai Cucumber Salad

This is another one of those recipes that I posted last summer, before I entered the digitial camera age, and when no one, and I do mean no one, was reading my blog. It's such a great recipe, I thought it deserved a photo so you can see how yummy it looks. After all the eating in San Francisco my friend Mary and I are doing phase one of the South Beach Diet for a few weeks, so this recipe was perfect for dinner last night.

The recipe was adapted from Bon Appetit magazine. One of the changes I made was to replace the sugar with Splenda, but if you're not watching carbs, or don't like Splenda, just make your version with sugar. Please use fresh lime juice if you can. I buy limes and freeze the juice so I always have some.

This recipe uses Thai Fish Sauce (nam pla) which is not exactly the same as fish sauce from other Asian countries. I used A Taste of Thai brand virgin fish sauce, which can be found in many grocery stores. If you're not used to fish sauce, you may be put off a little by the smell, but it tastes wonderful. You could reduce the amount a little if you're skeptical, or possibly even substitute soy sauce for a less authentically Thai version that would still taste good. The green Tabasco sauce could be replaced by a couple of green chiles that were finely chopped, but I love the flavor of green Tabasco, and it's easy to use when you need a tiny bit of spicy flavor.

Wake Up Your Mouth Thai Cucumber Salad
(3-4 servings)

2 European cucumbers or 4 fresh garden cucumbers
1/2 cup chopped fresh mint (measure after chopping)
1/4 cup (or more) chopped peanuts

dressing:
1/4 cup fresh lime juice
1 1/2 T Thai Fish Sauce (nam pla)
1 1/2 T Splenda or sugar
1 tsp. green Tabasco sauce
1 1/2 tsp. garlic puree (sometimes called ground garlic in Asian food stores)
salt and pepper to taste

Cut ends off cucumbers, then cut off the peel, leaving thin strips of peel in stripes along the cucumber. Cut striped cucumbers in half lengthwise, then in 1/2 inch slices. Wash mint, dry well and chop coarsely. Coarsely chop peanuts.

Mix dressing ingredients. Combine chopped mint and cucumbers in plastic bowl with a snap on lid, pour dressing over, put lid on and shake a few times so cucumbers and mint are completely coated with dressing. Pour into serving bowl, season with salt and pepper if desired, sprinkle chopped peanuts over and serve immediately.

I discovered last summer that this doesn't keep well at all; the taste of the mint completely overtakes the other ingredients if it's refrigerated overnight, so make as much as will be eaten right away. You could mix the dressing in advance and keep it refrigerated, then toss with the cucumbers and mint whenever you wanted to eat some.

With the substitution of Splenda for the sugar, this recipe would be perfect for any phase of the South Beach Diet. Even if you used sugar, this would still be very low in carbs. It would taste great with Forbidden City Chicken, Sauteed Scallops with Garlic, or Pork Chops with Balsamic Glaze.

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