This week I have another peach recipe for you, but this is no ordinary peach recipe. This Thai-style sour salad is made with peaches, tofu, and green beans. The dressing is amazing; it is sour yet complex in a lick-up-every-drop kind of way.
Most Thai-style salads are made with papaya and are made very (very) spicy. The only spice I included was some red pepper flake to season the tofu, so this salad is pretty mild and fits my midwestern palate well.
The peaches and tomato take the place of the traditional papaya, and plenty of lime juice in the dressing makes it sour.
I use a bed of snap beans to serve it all. They are very similar to green beans, so that’s how I have it written in the recipe. I enjoy growing all kinds of heirlooms in my garden, and the snap beans pictured here are delicious and only different from green beans due to their flat shape.
Tofu makes an excellent protein choice for this salad because it soaks up the dressing well. The dressing is made with fish sauce which adds a definitive flavor profile to the dressing. It’s funky and complex, and frankly traditional in a Thai-style salad.
My favorite part of this salad is the peanuts on top. Their crunchy texture and nutty flavor both add tremendously to this salad. I generously load mine up with lots of peanuts!
Variations to the Thai-Style Sour Salad with Peaches:
- Make it Vegan: Use a vegan fish sauce alternative.
- Swap the protein: If you don’t like tofu and you are using the fish sauce, shrimp or bay scallops would be delicious. If you want to keep it plant based, you could try tempeh or chickpeas.
- Make it spicy: Blend a serrano chili pepper into the dressing. Omit the red pepper flake.
- 2 cups green beans, trimmed and cut to 1 inch lengths
- 8 oz block tofu, drained and diced
- 1 TBS canola oil
- ¼ tsp each: kosher salt and crushed red pepper flake
- 1 medium peach, diced
- 1 small tomato, diced
- ¼ cup coarsely minced cilantro
- ⅓ cup peanuts
- 1 large lime, juiced (about 2-3 TBS)
- 2 TBS olive oil
- 1 ½ TBS brown sugar
- 1 TBS fish sauce
- ⅛ tsp kosher salt
- Blanch the green beans in boiling salted water for 4 minutes. Drain well and place back in the pot.
- Whisk together the dressing ingredients. Pour 1-2 TBS of the dressing over the green beans, tossing to coat. Let this rest while you prep the rest of the salad.
- In a skillet, toss the tofu in canola oil and season with ¼ tsp salt and red pepper flake. Cook until crispy and golden brown, stirring occasionally. Remove from the heat and toss the tofu with 1-2 TBS dressing, just enough to let the tofu absorb it all.
- On two plates, layer the marinated green beans, tofu, peach, tomato, cilantro and peanuts. Drizzle with the remaining dressing.
Recipe inspired by Bon Appetit.
