Thai Beef Salad

Description

At a glance

Nutrition rating

Allergy/intolerance

Main Ingredient

Serves

Recipe by Mel Kettle.

Cold chilly days in winter are not really the time for salad, but I'm trying to be healthy and lose weight. So salads it is! This one is a favourite - it's sooo easy and so full of flavour. And if you add extra chilli it's actually quite warming! Also gorgeous as leftovers for lunch the next day.

Ingredients

400g beef fillet
pepper
150g vermicilli bean thread noodles (the Asian variety - I normally use the Pandaroo brand)

For the salad:
1 cucumber, chopped
2 large tomatoes, chopped
1 large red capsicum, deseeded and chopped
½ red onion, sliced finely
1 bunch of fresh coriander, chopped (stalks and leaves only)
1 bunch of fresh Thai basil, remove the leaves and tear them into smaller pieces

For the sauce:
juice of 1-2 limes (start with one, add extra to taste)
1 tbs fish sauce
½ tbs palm sugar (or brown sugar)
1 tsp sesame oil
2 tsp soy sauce
1 tsp grated fresh ginger
1 long red chilli, chopped finely

Methods/steps

Heat the oven to 180°C.

Season the beef on a baking tray with pepper.

Roast the beef for about 20 minutes so it is still pink (I usually use a larger piece of beef so there are leftovers, but you will need to adjust the cooking time accordingly).

Remove the beef from the oven once it's cooked to your liking (rare, medium, well done) and leave it to rest for 15 minutes while you make the salad and the sauce.

Once the beef has rested, slice it thinly.

To make the sauce - stir all the sauce ingredients together in a small bowl until the sugar has dissolved. Let it sit for 15 minutes at least for the flavours to develop. Add extra lime, sugar or fish sauce as necessary to taste.

Cook the bean thread noodles according to the directions on the packet (it takes about 2 minutes in a pot of boiling water). Drain and leave to cool.

To make the salad, place all ingredients into a large bowl and gently toss together.

To assemble, place the bean thread noodles on the bottom of four plates, add the salad, add the beef and spoon over the dressing.