Hello dear neighbors ! Here is a recipe that I used to make quite often when our children were still living with us. Somehow I forgot about it, but the other day as I ended up with just a handful of green beans picked from our garden it all came back to me ! Actually, you can make it with leftover beans from another meal. As this is a salad, it doesn’t really matter if your beans are freshly cooked or not. I also included leftover baked sweet potato cubes from another previous meal. Basically, an “everything but the kitchen sink” type of salad! It is naturally gluten-free and can be vegan if you leave out the chicken. I love the crunch of the almonds in there. If you are worried about sulfites, make sure you use organic almonds only, and only add fresh chives if you tolerate them (same family as onions). My husband can have a little, so I put about a teaspoon in the salad, which classifies as « Asian » because of the dressing : coconut milk, tamari, and sesame oil.
That’s about it. Our garden is in bad need of rain, hence the skinny beans. They (the weather people) keep telling us it’s on its way, but so far it hasn’t been much more than a few drops. I had been painting shutters this past week ; if it really gets wet outside I will turn to the indoor upkeep of the house. And if you are wondering why my dear husband doesn’t get involved in all this, well, the answer is very simple : unlike his lucky wife, he is still working… and he also firmly believes in gender equality!
xx I have no idea who said this, do you ?
Ingredients ( serves 2 hungry people)
– about 100 g / 2.5 oz rice ; for more color, you can mix white and brown, white and red, or even white and wild rice. Here I used 1/3 part red rice and 2/3 part white basmati rice
– a good handful of green beans, to be cooked
– leftover roasted sweet potato cubes
– about 20 organic almonds (note that there are less in the photo, I only had a dozen and realized afterwards that more would be better)
– some sesame oil for cooking the almonds
– some chicken breast, to be cooked (optional)
for the dressing :
– 3 TBSP coconut milk, preferably organic, with little or no additives, I always take the time to read the labels , I hope you do too !
– 2 TBSP tamari sauce (gluten-free soy sauce), organic
– 1 TBSP sesame oil
– some chives if desired and tolerated
How to :
1. Cook the green beans and rice as you normally would. I do not own a rice-cooker and most always cook it in the steamer.
2. Cut chicken breast into small pieces and cook in some margarine or cooking oil.
3. Cook almonds in sesame oil, on low heat, until they puff up a little.
4. Mix the ingredients for the dressing and chop chives.
5. Toss everything together, sit down and enjoy !
sulfite-free cooking 
I will send some Scottish rain down to you and your beans. It was a fine sunny day today so perhaps it’s already on its way to you 🙂
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Please, please do! What makes it worse, is that this is a recurring situation and the water table is low. Our neighbor has a well, but we don’t. And there is nothing like rain water for the garden…
Thank you Kathryn!
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I can’t imagine gardening without rain. As depressing as it is when it is pouring down and I can’t get outside, rain is vital for growth. All my best wishes to you.
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