Friends for Weight Loss

This Sesame Cucumber Salad is incredibly easy to make and quite tasty.  It works well as a side dish or served up on top of a salad using the marinade as the “dressing”.  Make up a batch and store it in the fridge to snack on whenever you want something sweet and crunchy that will not eat up your points+ budget.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 Large English Cucumbers or 10 Small Japanese Cucumbers
• 1 ½ cups Rice Vinegar
• 4 Tablespoons Aji-Miirin (Sweet Japanese Wine)
• ½ cup sugar (the real deal works best here)
• ¼ cup sesame seeds
• Sea Salt

INSTRUCTIONS 

1.  Roast sesame seeds in a pan over medium heat until toasted about 1-2 minutes stirring frequently until lightly browned.

 2.  Thinly slice the cucumbers using a salad shooter or manual cucumber slicer. Place sliced cucumbers in a strainer and sprinkle with salt until well covered.  Let stand for 15-30 minutes and rinse. After rinsing squeeze excess water and juice out of cucumbers.

 3.  Stir the vinegar and sugar until the sugar is dissolved.  Add cucumbers and sesame seeds to the liquid mixture and stir well.

 4.  Let stand 1-2 hours or overnight (best results) to marinate.

 Note: Due to the content of the vinegar, the items store best in glass dishes or jars.

Makes twelve 1/4 cup servings, 1 points+ each