Broccoli-Peanut Salad

Here’s a dish we originally had at a local restaurant.  It was okay, but we thought it had a lot of potential to be even better.  After tweaking the ingredients, we think this is the best version of the recipe we’ve come up with.  You can make this up to a day ahead and refrigerate until you’re ready to serve.

Broccoli-Peanut Salad

Ingredients

1 bunch fresh Broccoli (2 medium heads)

1/3 cup mayonnaise

8 oz. plain yogurt

1 tbl. low-fat sour cream

1 tbl. honey

2 tsp. brown mustard

pinch of ground black pepper

pinch of salt

½ tsp. soy sauce

½ cup raisins (we usually use the golden raisins)

2/3 cup red onion, thinly sliced then cut into about 1” pieces

½ cup roasted red bell peppers, very coarsely chopped

¾ cup roasted salted peanuts

Directions

·         Cut the florets off the broccoli, leaving a little bit of the stems

·         Break the florets up into medium sized chunks (not chopped, you want good sized pieces)

·         Slice the tender part of the stems into julienne style pieces

·         Place the stems into a steamer first (before the florets – they take longer to steam), and put the florets on top of the stems (also stem-side down)

·         Steam the broccoli until crisp-tender (don’t over cook!) about 10 minutes (you can test one of the stems . . .if they’re tender, it’s all done enough) then drain and rinse with cold water until cool

·         In a small bowl, mix the mayonnaise, yogurt, sour cream, honey, mustard, black pepper, salt and soy sauce

·         Put the raisins in a small sauce pan and barely cover with water

·         Bring raisins to a boil and immediately remove from heat, strain and rinse in cold water

·         Put the broccoli in a large serving bowl, add the raisins, onion, peppers and peanuts

·         Pour the sauce over the broccoli mix and toss well

·         Chill at least one hour before serving (toss once more just before serving to re-coat with the sauce)