Mango-Broccoli Salad

[fuzzyred]

I'm on afternoons again this week and after last week's soup I decided a salad was the way to go. I made the Mango-Broccoli Salad from the Better Homes and Gardens New Cookbook.


Ingredients
4 cups chopped fresh broccoli
1 large ripe mango, seeded, peeled, and diced
1/2 cup cashews
1 small red onion, cut into thin wedges
1/2 cup bottled buttermilk ranch salad dressing
2 tablespoons orange juice
1 tablespoon prepared horseradish
1 11-ounce can mandarin orange sections, drained

Directions
1. In a large salad bowl combine broccoli, mango, cashews, and onion. For dressing, in a small bowl stir together ranch dressing, orange juice, amd horseradish. Pour over broccoli mixture; toss to coat. Gently stir in mandarin orange sections. Serve immediately or cover and chill up to two hours.


Thoughts and Variations
I used two mangos, because they looked small to me (I don't actually know what counts as large for a mango), I diced the onion since I find them to be on the spicy side. I also forgot the horseradish so that got left out. I also accidentally added things out of order, so the orange sections went in with everything else and I just mixed it carefully.

It's decently tasty but it feels a little like separate ingredients just thrown together. Maybe because there is nothing that makes it easy to get all the pieces in the same bite? It was fairly easy to put together though and it does taste good. I may make this again but we'll have to see.

Comments

my random thoughts

[minoanmiss]

I think this might taste better as a slaw, so the ingredients can mingle better. I really love my paddle slicer, so if I were making this I would use it to shave the broccoli and onion very thinly, and salt and drain them (this will also mute the onion's spiciness). They will then tangle around the other ingredients and bind the salad together better. Also the dressing looks a little thin. I might crush half the cashews into crumbs, to better distribute them and to thicken the dressing a little.

Re: my random thoughts

[fuzzyred]

Those sound like really good ideas. I think I shall try your suggestions if I do indeed make this recipe again. Thanks for sharing your thoughts :)