This salad is one of my favorites and has three ingredients that make it successful: crunch, crunch and crunch. The complexity of flavors from the lemongrass dressing play in your mouth like the perfect symphony.
Tips:
Make the Lemongrass Dressing
Place a saucepan on the stove at medium heat. Add the chicken broth, lemongrass, onion, ginger, garlic clove, thyme and shrimp heads and/or tail shells. Bring the liquid to a boil, then reduce the heat and let simmer until the liquid is reduced to 1/4 cup, about 10 minutes.
Remove the liquid from the heat and strain into a bowl. Add the sweet chili sauce, rice vinegar, peanut butter, soy sauce, fish sauce, brown sugar, mint leaves and cilantro to the bowl. Blend until smooth with a hand immersion blender or blend in a full-size blender.
Fry the Rice Sticks
Place the oil in a saucepan on the stove over medium heat and warm to 350 degrees. The oil should be about 2 inches deep. When the oil is hot, drop in half of the rice sticks (about 1 oz). They will instantly fry to crispy (about 2 seconds). Flip the fried sticks over using tongs and fry an additional 2 seconds. Remove the rice sticks from the oil and allow them to dry on a paper towel. Note: if the oil isn’t hot enough, the rice sticks will not instantly fry. If this happens, remove and discard them, then start over.
Fry the Shrimp
In a bowl, whisk two eggs until frothy. Butterfly the shrimp tails and add them to the egg mixture. In another bowl, mix together the panko bread crumbs, flour and Tony Chachere’s Creole Seasoning. Remove the shrimp from the egg mixture and toss in the flour bowl until they are well coated. Fry the shrimp, six at a time, in the oil for 1 minute. Remove the shrimp from the oil and let them dry on a paper towel.
Make the Salad
Place the spring mix lettuce in a bowl with 4 tbsp of the lemongrass dressing and toss until lightly coated. Divide the lettuce onto two salad plates. Sprinkle each salad with the carrots and wasabi peas. Place six shrimp on each salad. Drizzle the lemongrass dressing over the shrimp and salad. Garnish with fried rice sticks. Serve.
