Recipe: Zingy Spring Salad

With lots of green fresh herbs, sweet-sour green apple and tender sprouts, this is a great salad to rejuvenate a stagnant and congested Liver in Spring. The dressing is a combination of therapeutic flavours – Sour, Sweet, Pungent and Salty. The fifth therapeutic flavour – Bitter –comes from the herbs, so that the cleansing and renewing energy enters all of the channels and organ systems, giving you a gentle all-over detox with an emphasis on Liver and Gall Bladder cleansing.

Enjoy this salad as an accompaniment to grilled fish, or with tahini and avocado spread on sourdough bread.

Serves 1 as a light meal, or 4 as a side salad with other dishes

Salad

Few stems of watercress
Few stems of coriander
Few stems of parsley
Few stems of basil
Few mint leaves
1 green apple, diced
Handful of alfalfa sprouts (or combo eg alfalfa & garlic etc)

Dressing

Sour: Juice of ½ lime (or lemon, or 1 tbsp raw unrefined apple cider vinegar)
Salty: Splash of tamari (or medium soy sauce)
Sweet: Splash of mirin (or few drops of maple syrup or honey)
Pungent: 1 tsp minced ginger
Sweet/Sour: 3 sundried tomatoes, finely chopped


Roughly chop all herbs, including soft stems, and combine with the apple and sprouts in a bowl. Adjust proportions of herbs to taste. If serving later, pour a little lime juice over chopped apple to prevent browning.

Combine all dressing ingredients, check balance of tastes and adjust if desired (Sweet, Sour, Pungent and Salty). Dress and toss the salad and serve immediately.



See also: Growing your own sprouts

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This post is brought to you by Lois Nethery, acupuncturist and Chinese medicine herbalist at Ocean Acupuncture in Curl Curl.

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Ocean Acupuncture is a natural medicine centre of independent health practitioners. The views expressed in this blog are the author's only and do not necessarily reflect the views of the other Ocean Acupuncture practitioners.
The information presented in this blog, and on the Ocean Acupuncture website, is for interest and educational purposes only and is not intended to be a substitute for health or medical information or advice. For health or medical advice, please consult your health professional.