Simple rice noodle salad

With the busy lives that we lead, we seldom have time to sit back and relax, let alone enjoy a quiet meal. To top it all, domestic help now a days is a big pain. So the typical scenario on a working day is you come home too tired to do anything and all you want to do is gulp down the first thing you see and hit the bed. Cooking takes a back seat and take away menus rule the kitchen counters. The result? Poor health, multiple tablets and so on.

Here is the perfect fix for one of those days. The rice noodles salad is my favourite and I usually include a bowl of tomato or spinach soup with it just so that I don't feel hungry later.

Check out this quick, simple recipe and do comment on the post below.

Preparation time: 15 minutes

Cooking time: 10 minutes

Serves 2

Ingredients:

80 gms boiled chicken breast, shredded

200 gms rice noodles

1 small onion

2 small tomatoes

1 small green bell pepper

1/2 red bell pepper

1 small cucumber, peeled

1 small fresh red chilli

1/4 cup bean sprouts

1 tsp sugar

1/2 tsp vinegar

1/2 tsp sesame oil (optional)

1/2 tsp soya sauce

2 tbsp olive oil

Handful of roasted peanuts

Salt to taste

Directions:

• Place rice noodles in a pan and fill water till it covers the noodles completely. Boil till the noodles are soft. Strain and keep them aside. Add a little bit of oil to the noodles to prevent them from sticking to each other.
• Chop the onion into thin slices.
• Chop the green, red pepper and tomatoes julienne.
• Chop the cucumber into thin slices. You could also de-seed them.
• Now in a large salad bowl add the noodles, red and green bell pepper, cucumber, bean sprouts, onions and shredded chicken.
• Next, add the wet ingredients like vinegar, soya sauce and olive oil. I also add a hint of sesame oil to give it an oriental flavour.
• Sprinkle sugar, chopped red chillis and handful of roasted peanuts. Add salt as per taste.
• Toss well and serve.

Note: You can skip the chicken and eat it as a vegetarian salad as well. For the non-vegetarians, you could also add boiled prawns instead of chicken.