I am not what I’d call a cole slaw afficionado. I’ve somewhat loosened my previous stance that cole slaw should be treated as decoration and never eaten, but I still much prefer potato or pasta salad if given the choice.
But I had a head of cabbage sitting in the fridge from the CSA two weeks ago, and needed to use it, so I bit the cole-slaw bullet. It’s apparently very trendy lately to hate on mayonnaise-based cole slaw; all the suggestions I got when I asked for slaw recipes use vinaigrette as dressing.
Poor ol’ mayo gets a bad rap, but I ended up with a damn good slaw. (Thanks to Sara Daum for the recipe suggestion.)
I wound up making my own variation on a New York Times recipe touted on The Wednesday Chef, which uses apples and nuts in the slaw and applesauce in the dressing to give nice fall flavor to what I’d always thought of as a summer dish. Whole mustard seeds tossed into the salad are an interesting idea, but in practice they don’t do much to the flavor (or maybe my mustard seeds are just old). Either way, this thing came out real tasty.
The original recipe calls for savoy cabbage, walnuts, and radish. I used what I had on hand: regular cabbage, pecans, and carrot. The original also has this elaborate process of grating the apple into acidulated water to keep it from browning, then squeezing out the water before adding to the salad mixture. I made my dressing a little more acidic and pour it on immediately after adding the apple, making all that unnecessary. But do make sure you add the dressing right after you grate the apple. My version makes 2 servings, but it’s easy to double (or triple, or…).
Summer-Fall Slaw with Apple and Applesauce
Adapted from Jeremy Fox’s Savoy Cabbage Slaw with Applesauce Vinaigrette and Mustard Seeds
Serves 2
Dressing:
1 tsp. Dijon mustard
1 1/2 Tbsp. cider vinegar
2 tsp. applesauce
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. pepper
1 1/2 Tbsp. olive oil
Salad:
1/2 head cabbage, shredded
2 carrots, shredded
1 apple
1/3 cup pecans, toasted and chopped into large pieces
1 tsp. mustard seeds
Stir together all dressing ingredients except oil. Whisk in oil until combined. Set aside.
Combine cabbage and carrot in a bowl. Core apple and grate into bowl (do not peel). Immediately add dressing and toss to combine. Add pecans and mustard seeds and toss again.