Recipe by Amy White | Photo by Sergio Salvador

Tat soi is a tender Asian green with a delicate mustardy flavor, much like bok choy. It makes great salad when the spoon-shaped leaves are tiny, but it’s better lightly cooked later in the season when it gets bigger. Early in the spring, you can use any kind of tender greens like baby spinach, lettuce, or arugula.

The spicy flavors of radishes and tat soi marry beautifully with this carrot dressing, but the flavors are very flexible. The idea is simply to get a little bit of salty, sweet, tangy, and spicy. Try apple instead of carrot juice, green garlic instead of green onion, baby turnips instead of radishes, mustard instead of ginger, leave out the sesame if you don’t have it – the possibilities are endless. 

TAT SOI AND RADISH SALAD WITH CARROT-MISO-SESAME DRESSING

Servings: 2

Ingredients

For the dressing:

  • 3 C. carrot juice or apple juice
  • 1/2 T. finely shredded fresh ginger or a pinch of dried ginger or mustard
  • 1 1/2 T. red or white miso or a splash of soy sauce to taste
  • 3 T. rice vinegar or other vinegar
  • 1/4 cup olive oil
  • 1/2 t. sesame oil preferably the good stuff from an Asian grocery

For the salad:

  • 1 large bunch tat soi or other tender greens
  • 4 radishes or baby turnips, thinly sliced
  • 1 green onion or green garlic, thinly sliced

Instructions

  • Boil the carrot or apple juice in a wide pot over medium-high heat, until reduced to 1/3 cup, about 25 minutes (if you don't have carrot juice, see below.*) Let the juice cool, then whisk in the remaining dressing ingredients. If you like, you can wilt the tat soi by steaming or microwaving for a minute or two, with just the water that clings to the leaves after washing. Arrange with the radishes and green onion, and drizzle with carrot dressing. 

*To make carrot juice without a juicer, you can chop and boil a few carrots until they are tender, then puree them with enough water to get a smooth texture. Then you can squeeze the puree through a clean flour sack type dish towel. Lay the towel (just 1 layer) inside a strainer and pour the puree in, then take up the corners of the towel and twist to make a sack with the puree inside. You should be able to squeeze the juice out slowly by twisting it tighter. Or if you have patience, you can leave it in the fridge overnight and see how much drips out.

+ other stories

Edible celebrates New Mexico's food culture, season by season. We believe that knowing where our food comes from is a powerful thing. With our high-quality, aesthetically pleasing and informative publication, we inspire readers to support and celebrate the growers, producers, chefs, beverage and food artisans, and other food professionals in our community.