Improvise

When the lentil rice and fruit salad you were planning to make for the big traditional 4th-of-July picnic up by the river cannot materialize because all the apples and grapes have been eaten by ravenous little fruit fiends, what do you do?

You improvise.

Sweet-and-sour Soybean Salad

3 c rice, cooked (I mixed short-grain white and brown rices for this, and please note I am not calling for 3 c of cooked rice, but 3 c and then cook it, get it?)
2 bags frozen, shelled edamame (soybeans, which I adore now thanks to my friend Crysty)
1 red bell pepper, diced
1 zucchini, diced
2 stalks celery, sliced on the diagonal
1/2 a small red onion, minced
1/4 c pickled ginger shreds (the red kind, not the pink kind)

1/4 c vegetable oil
1/4 c rice wine vinegar
1/4 c sugar
salt and pepper to taste

1/2 c sliced, toasted almonds

Combine everything in the first group of ingredients. You will need a very big bowl for this. This is a salad to take to a ward potluck with lots of hungry people.

Whisk together the dressing. Pour over the rice and veggies. Toss gently to distribute evenly. The salad can sit overnight at this point.

Gently stir in almonds just before serving.

I was hoping to have some of this salad to bring home. It didn't work that way. That sounds like a brag but it really is not much of one. All of the salads were absolutely cleaned out. I guess the 105 degree heat made us all very hungry, or something. I am guessing it makes about 20-24 good-sized servings.

One person did ask me for the recipe, so that was nice.