By retreating to one of our favorite diet dishes—Asian Chicken Salad—for the next several meals.

We make it in less than 5 minutes, thanks to:

• Dole Cole Slaw Mix (shredded cabbage and carrots)
• Perdue Short Cuts Carved Turkey Breast (restaurant secret: lots of that “chicken salad” out there is made with turkey, which allows for larger chunks of poultry)
• A few shakes of our SoyCha soy-based salad dressing and marinade (or other dressing made from canola oil, vinegar, tamari sauce, sesame oil and salt.

This takes less than 90 seconds to throw into a bowl and is delicious as is. But for more complexity, we take another two minutes to add:

• A sprinkle of toasted sesame seeds
• Chopped green onions (scallions)
• Some fresh orange segments, from a bounty of Cushman’s Honeybell oranges, received as a gift (they’re very, very juicy and come with a plastic juice-catching bib!)

SoyCha salad dressing/marinade and its
spicy sister. Photo by Hannah Kaminsky |
THE NIBBLE.

• Optional garnish: crispy noodles saved from Chinese take-out

SoyCha, from Palcha Products, is also a great marinade for meats and fish and a dressing for a fusion Chinese noodle dish (otherwise stated, toss your favorite pasta with it) or rice salad (or heck, potato salad, string bean salad, you-name-it). We’ve tried it with spinach salad and cole slaw, and used ChiliCha to make a spicy beef salad.

ChiliCha has a nice spicy kick—noticeable but not fiery. We enjoy it in as a dressing for the Asian Chicken Salad. Tipsee Sesame is a gluten-free version, made without soy paste, which contains wheat. Now, we’d wish for a sugar-free version. There are only 3g of sugar per two-tablespoon serving, but the less hidden sugar in our diet, the better. We need to balance ourselves out on the days that we’re not facing down all those chocolates, cookies and brownies.