This sauce is a wonderfully simple, versatile creation. It is delicious on top of a green or spinach salad with almonds, green onions, mandarin oranges, and crispy noodles. It would also top julienne carrot and cucumber nicely, or sauteed spinach and sesame seeds. It also makes a fantastic dipping sauce for spring rolls (fill them with rice noodles, ginger pork, carrot, and cucumber for a cool summer treat) or Thai-style satay. It is also delicious tossed in with leftover cold rice noodles on their own.
The flavor of this sauce actually gets better with time—it’s too sharp of a taste right at first, but it becomes much smoother later on. Make it the day before to let the taste mature, then refrigerate. Let it sit out an hour or so to warm to room temperature before serving.
It takes less than 10 minutes to make and stores in the fridge for a good 2 weeks. This will make roughly 1 1/2 cups.
- 1/2 c. rice vinegar
- 1/4 c. honey
- 1/2 - 3/4 c. smooth peanut butter (this is a taste preference)
- 2 T. soy sauce
- 1/8 tsp. red pepper flakes
- 3-4 cloves garlic
- ~ 20 fresh mint leaves
- juice of 1/8 average lime plus 1/4 teaspoon powdered sugar OR 1 tsp Rose's presweetened Lime Juice
- 1/4 c. peanut oil or sesame oil (I prefer peanut, sesame tastes too strong to me)
Directions:
Place all ingredients except oil in your blender jar. Process until smooth. Slowly add the oil until all incorporated.
For use as a salad dressing blend in 1/8 to1/4 cup water until desired consistency is reached.
The original recipe I began experimenting with came from http://vegweb.com/food/misc/4924.shtml but was much tweaked through trial and error and my finicky taste buds. (The original, among other things, called for cilantro instead of mint, and was hotter with more pepper and no lime.)