Szechuan Soba Salad

Our great, grad school-bound buddy Aubrey “Bobby Beers” White recently high-tailed it out of town. But before she did, she broke out a box of packaged snacks from Japan, all filled with neon colored pickles, she’d been saving for over a year and we threw a sweet and sour going away party for the old gal. We washed it all down with two bottles of unfiltered sake, tempura-fried mushrooms, eggplant, sweet potato and broccoli, and this sweet, cold soba noodle salad. The oil-slicked noodles are perked with peppery cucumber slivers dunked in vinegar: an improvised recipe. Gobble it with people you like. Bon voyage Bobby Beers!

(Serves 6-8)

Szechuan Pickles

4 Japanese cucumbers
1 small bulb ginger
3 tsp. fresh black pepper
1 tsp. Szechuan pepper
1/8 cup rice vinegar
1 Tbs. soy sauce

1. Slice the thin cukes in half lengthwise, leaving eight pieces, and slice into matchstick-sized slices. Peel ginger and slice into even smaller matchsticks. Place both in a shallow mixing bowl. Toss all other ingredients and let sit 20-30 minutes or longer while you prepare noodles.

Soba Noodle Salad

2 1/2 cups water
4 Tbs. sesame oil
1 tsp sea salt
8-10 oz soba noodles
1/8 sesame seeds

2. In a medium-size pot, bring water to a rolling boil and add salt and 1 Tbs. of sesame oil. Toss in soba noodles and cook 8-10 minutes or until fully cooked, making sure they don’t stick too much.

3. In a small sauté pan, heat sesame seeds up for 2-3 minutes, tossing to keep from toasting too much.

4. Once cooked, cool noodles under cold water and drain well. Place in a large mixing bowl and top with hot sesame seeds and rest of the sesame oil. Then add the freshly Szechuan pickles and toss thoroughly. Serve room temperature or refrigerate for 2 hours and serve coolish. (Add Sriracha as desired!)

Beverage: Unfiltered sake, St. Red Rogue Dry-Hopped
Soundtrack: Elliot Smith’s self-titled