Baby Bok Choy with Fermented Black Bean Sauce and Cashews

When we stopped at Wegman’s last night after dinner the baby bok choy looked so fresh that I felt I needed to buy 4 and figure out what to do with them later. This is normally how I grocery shop. I buy what looks good and figure it out later. For some reason I didn’t really give dinner any thought today so we had a “fusion” meal, which is what I call it when I mix different cultures in one meal.

As always I lightly cooked the bok choy (since it is part of the cruciferous vegetable family) so that it would retain the maximum amount of nutrition. I added the black bean sauce and mirin for flavor and the cashews for texture. Here is the Asian inspired bok choy dish we had tonight.

Baby Bok Choy with Fermented Black Bean Sauce and Cashews
Serves 2

Ingredients:

4 baby bok choy, cut in half top to bottom
1 teaspoon canola oil
1 tablespoon fermented black bean sauce
1 tablespoon mirin (or use rice wine vinegar sweetened with a little agave or stevia)
1 tablespoon cashews, or to taste

Direction:

Run water through the inside of the cut baby bok choy to remove any grit that may have accumulated. Pat dry the bok choy halves.

Add the canola oil to skillet and place the bok choy in the skillet cut side down. Cook on high for three or four minutes, until just tender. Now plate the bok choy.

Whisk together the fermented black bean sauce and mirin and drizzle over each plate. Top with cashews and serve hot.

Nutritional Information:

Amount Per Serving
Calories - 78.82
Calories From Fat (48%) - 37.96

Total Fat - 5.02g
Saturated Fat - 0.6g
Cholesterol - 0mg
Sodium - 652.22mg
Potassium - 430.67mg
Total Carbohydrates - 9.62g
Fiber - 2.03g
Sugar - 3.37g
Protein - 3.26g

Comments:

If you weren’t watching your carb intake as closely as we are this would be good over brown rice. The bok choy was a little crisp but cut easily with a knife. It had good flavor from the black bean sauce and mirin.

Each serving of this dish contained approximately 6,250IU of vitamin A, 150mg of calcium, 95mg of folate, 65mcg of vitamin K, and 70mg of phosphorus. How about that nutrition for less than 80 calories?

Unrelated note:

The hubby pulled the dehydrator out of the box and set it up for me. He is such a good guy. The dehydrator is smaller than I expected, but in a good way. I just can’t decide what I am going to make first. Now I am wishing that we were going to be home tomorrow to play with it. I am just like a little kid with a new toy sometimes (this is one of those times).

It is getting late here so I am going to call it a night soon. I hope you all have a wonderful evening.