I'm sure that someone else has made a Vermicelli Salad before. Having a new idea in food is kind of a rarity. Everything that we make has culinary influence, even if it's subconscious. I'm incredibly fond of these vermicelli salads. I don't quite remember what prompted the foray into them. But I've become fond of describing them as a cold curry or pseudo-Asian pasta salad. I do not cook traditional Thai food. Although I definitely have some pretty deep seeded Thai influence in my cooking style and flavor preferences. I also make Italian food for a living. So, finding the two combined in my dishes isn't unheard of. I wouldn't necessarily say that vermicelli salads are quintessentially me because other people do find them surprisingly refreshing and familiar in a way that they also cannot necessarily place! But they are some of my favorite summer dishes and I really enjoy bringing them to potlucks on fun summer days.
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Variations of Vermicelli Salad
Vermicelli salads aren't necessarily the most common of things ever. Whenever I try and describe what I'm bringing to the potluck? I always get some unusual stares. It's essentially a bastardized Italian pasta salad with a Japanese flare. I almost ironically call it "fusion." Which is a kind of dirty word in the culinary industry. Although we all have different culinary influences as well as personal flavor profile interests. The movement of food is also intrinsically linked to travel and trade throughout history. So, calling any one particular thing "authentic" is really more of a result of a concurrence of events. Which means that I don't necessarily call particular influences "fusion" as much as just a result of what I have on hand and what I like to eat.
Add about 4 inches of water to a large pot and bring to a boil over high heat.
Cook vermicelli according to the manufacturer's instructions.Vermicelli cooks very quickly. I tend to add the vermicelli and then immediately remove it from heat. Then, go on to prepare the produce. Merely sitting in the once boiling water is sufficient enough soften it enough to eat without overcooking.
Fry Tofu
While the pot is boiling for the vermicelli, drain the water out of the tofu and cut into cubes.
Wrap in paper towels to absorb the moisture.It's important to absorb as much water out of the tofu as you can. Oil is less dense than water, so the molecules repel one another. With cold ingredients, this causes separation. When you're frying at high temperatures, though, this can cause boiling hot oil to spray back at you.
Meanwhile, preheat oil in a cast iron skillet over medium-high heat.
When the skillet has preheated and the majority of the water has absorbed into the paper towels, carefully add the tofu to the skillet. Fry until golden brown. This should take about 2-4 minutes. Rotate until all sides are evenly fried.
Remove from heat and wrap again in paper towels to absorb the excess oil.
Assemble Salad
Mince and chop all of the produce and add to a large bowl.
It can help to mix the tamari, rice vinegar, and tahini together in a separate bowl and then mix in. Although this isn't explicitly necessary as long as the tahini doesn't clump together.
Add in tofu, avocado, and sprouts. You can really mix the peanuts in at any time. However, sprouts go back much faster than the other ingredients, so I don't mix them in until serving and store them separately.
Serve immediately or chill in the refrigerator for about an hour. I'm quite fond of this dish at room temperature or mixed in with salmon or scrambled eggs. It keeps incredibly well in the refrigerator, though. There's enough sodium and acidity in the mix to last for about a week without the produce browning. The liquid will start to separate and just need stirring before serving again.
This Page Contains Edited Images
As a general rule, I don't like to edit my images and I am firmly against alteration of images in food blogs. It's not something that we generally think about when it comes to recipes. But food styling, editing, alteration, and even faking entirely is just as rampant a problem in the recipe realm as anything else! Cooking is a very visual art and you can tell when a lot of foods are cooked based on the color. So, when this is altered and you can't use the coloration as a gauge, it makes it quite difficult to follow some recipes. I have an entire article about Food Styling and Unrealistic Expectations of Recipes.
Because of this, I try very hard not to alter any of my photos. I like to take photos with natural sunlight during the day. Ordinarily this is very true to color and I don't edit the photos at all. However, since my place is very warm with a lot of yellow lighting, sometimes my camera overcompensates and ends up with an unnatural blue tone. In the following images on this page, I adjusted the levels and hue to try and make this more true to color. In the interest of transparency, these are the before and after photos.
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