I ate my teriyaki meatball bowls all week as meal prep and absolutely loved them, but I desperately need another vegetable side to balance things out. So, I whipped up a quick crunchy cabbage salad and coated it in my yummy sesame ginger dressing. It was just perfect. The crunchiness of the the cabbage, carrots, and peanuts was such a perfect contrast to the meatballs and rice.
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Meal Prep It!
This salad holds up beautifully in the refrigerator, so it’s a great salad to use for meal prep! Just store the sesame ginger dressing separately from the vegetable salad mix, and add it just before serving. The salad mix (minus dressing) should stay good in the fridge for about 4-5 days.
How to Serve Crunchy Cabbage Salad
This salad makes a great side dish, but you can also turn it into a main dish by topping it with some Easy Teriyaki Chicken, Honey Sriracha Tofu, Easy Orange Chicken, or Sesame Tempeh. You can also add some cold noodles to this salad for extra oomph (this is the same base as my Cold Peanut Noodle Salad).
What if I Don’t Like Cilantro?
You either love or you hate cilantro. It’s all good. If you’re not a cilantro lover, just leave it out of this salad. No need to replace it with anything. :)
See the full post for the Sesame Ginger Dressing for more information on the ingredients and step by step instructions.
Crunchy Cabbage Salad
Servings 6 1 cup eachIngredients
Salad
- 4 cups shredded purple cabbage ($0.97)
- 2 carrots ($0.15)
- 4 green onions ($0.22)
- 1/2 bunch fresh cilantro ($0.40)
- ½ cup peanuts ($0.25)
Sesame Ginger Dressing
- ¼ cup neutral salad oil* ($0.16)
- 2 Tbsp rice vinegar ($0.27)
- 1 Tbsp soy sauce ($0.06)
- 1.5 Tbsp honey ($0.18)
- 1/2 Tbsp tahini ($0.10)
- 1/4 tsp toasted sesame oil ($0.02)
- 1 clove garlic, minced ($0.08)
- 1/2 Tbsp grated fresh ginger ($0.15)
Instructions
- Shred the cabbage as finely as possible. Grate the carrots and slice the green onion. Pull the cilantro leaves from the stems
- Add the shredded cabbage, carrots, green onion, cilantro, and peanuts to a large bowl. Toss to combine.
- To make the dressing, add the salad oil, rice vinegar, soy sauce, honey, tahini, toasted sesame oil, garlic, and ginger to a blender. Blend until the dressing is smooth and creamy.
- When you're ready to eat, drizzle the dressing over the salad and toss until coated. Serve immediately
See how we calculate recipe costs here.
Equipment
- White Cutting Boards
- Chef’s Knife
- Grater
- Small Blender
Notes
Nutrition
Have you tried this recipe?Mention @budgetbytes or tag #budgetbytes on Instagram!How to Make Crunchy Cabbage Salad – Step by Step Photos
First, shred your purple cabbage. You’ll want about 4 cups once shredded, which for me was half of this small head of cabbage. To shred the cabbage, first cut it into quarters, then cut the core off the quarter. Finally, cut across the quarter to shred the cabbage as finely as possible.
Also shred two carrots (I use a cheese grater) and slice 4 green onions.
Pull the leaves from about ½ bunch of cilantro (about 1 cup cilantro leaves). Add the shredded cabbage, carrot, sliced green onion, cilantro leaves, and ½ cup peanuts to a large bowl.
Next, make the Sesame Ginger Dressing. Add ¼ cup neutral salad oil (anything light-flavored oil like canola, peanut, grape seed, etc.), 2 Tbsp rice vinegar, 1 Tbsp soy sauce, 1.5 Tbsp honey, ½ Tbsp tahini, ¼ tsp toasted sesame oil, 1 clove garlic (minced), and ½ Tbsp grated fresh ginger to a blender. Blend until the dressing is smooth and creamy.
Pour the sesame ginger dressing over the salad and enjoy!
Cannot stop eating this salad!
This salad is amazing and the sauce in particular. We also have the sauce with crispy tofu and it’s just the best. Even our toddler loves it. Thank you for the recipe!
Amazing and super easy to prepare. A go-to for weekly meal prep.
I made this with a bag of the pre-cut cabbage slaw & it was delicious!!! I did make a few tweaks- replaced the salad oil with a little extra vinegar, soy sauce, and water (about 1T each) since I don’t have oil in my house, reduced the honey just a bit (1T), and added a spoonful of super crunchy PB to the dressing because sadly I did not have a full 1/2 cup of peanuts. I am positive the original recipe is probably perfect as-is too, so just wanted to share that even with tweaks, this one is repeatable. Thanks for the recipe!
Delicious!!!
Absolutely delicious and perfect as is. I made no changes. Served with honey sriracha tofu and was a huge hit!
This is so good and healthy!! Will probably be munching on it all day. I wish I had shredded my cabbage thinner and my carrots a little thicker. Food Lion let me down so I subbed PB for the tahini since they didn’t have it. Still delicious. My bf is a cilantro hater so I’m topping my bowls off with cilantro instead of mixing in.
This also works great with store-bought sesame dressing. Just in case I don’t have garlic or fresh ginger on hand and don’t want to make a trip to the store
Really enjoyed your crunchy cabbage salad. Great blend of flavors. Hit the spot on a hot, summer day.
I used napa cabbage as there wasn’t any purple available. I would definitely increase the sesame seed oil next time, and I quite liked it once I added in some sriracha.
Should the peanuts be raw, roasted, Planters dry roasted with salt or without?
Any of the above. :) I personally prefer roasted and unsalted, but it’s just going to be your personal preference.
Delicious
Hi thank you for this recipe, it’s a staple in our house… it’s so flavorful and it keeps really well in the fridge! Do you have any slow cooker pulled chicken recipes that would pair really well with this salad to make it a complete meal? Any sort of Thai inspired slow cooker chicken recipe you’d recommend? Thanks again and please keep posting!!
Hmm, I don’t have a recipe like that but you might like Jessica Gavin’s Honey Hoisin Garlic Chicken. It’s on my website, but it’s from her cookbook.
I love this recipe – I eat it so often now! Last night, I was making the dressing and absentmindedly added two tablespoons of soy sauce. Instead of throwing it out and starting again, I doubled everything else, so I have a ton of dressing. Now, I do still have half a cabbage so I’d be more than happy to just make it again, but I was wondering if the dressing would freeze – do you think it would survive? Thanks!
Hmm, honestly I’ve never tried to freeze a dressing like this! I think the only bad thing that could happen would be for the emulsion to separate, but I’m sure if you just whisk it up again it would be fine. :)
This salad was soooooo delicious! The dressing is good enough to drink. I was going to add some lime juice to it but I’m so glad I didn’t because it was absolutely perfect as written. I think the salad would be good with some bell pepper or mandarin oranges, and I’ll try it with sliced almonds instead of peanuts–but not because it wasn’t perfect; just for some variations.
This is my new go-to Asian dressing.
I absolutely love this salad. I added a bit more ginger but kept everything else the same. I was skeptical because I’m not a huge cabbage fan, but it was delicious. Thank you for the great recipe!
I made this last night and thought it was really good. I used honey roasted peanuts which made it a little sweet so I added a little salt to the dressing to balance it out since I used a low sodium soy sauce. Next time I would use a salty peanut. I thought this was great and am surprised someone threw it in the trash. I thought it was a nice asian side that I served with Korean Tacos. Thanks for the recipe Beth!
This was so good and will also make it into my regular rotation. I didn’t have fresh ginger or garlic so used a pinch of dried each, no cilantro. I added tri-color quinoa and grilled tofu and it was a delicious hearty meal.
I made this and it didn’t really work for me, I felt like the peanut butter and the lime really didn’t mesh, like I could taste each ingredient separately. I love budget bytes but won’t be trying this one again!
There isn’t any peanut butter or lime in this recipe
Loved this salad and dressing – it’s going into our regular rotation! I used bagged slaw mix for laziness, even though the purple cabbage is prettier. And I used cashews instead of peanuts. Served with chicken thighs marinated in Korean BBQ sauce.
HUGE hit and now permanent addititon to my rotation. I served this with the Ginger Soy Glazed Chicken thighs. We also served it with the leftover chicken, cold, the next day and I think they actually liked that better!
Tossed in a cup of dried szechuan noodle. All I had was chopped/broken cashews and no cilantro. Served this at our Fire Hall with your ginger dressing. People went back for seconds and more until it was all gone and many wanted the recipe.
After reading the reviews – I made this for Father’s Day dinner … the dish is very colorful – which is another reason I made it … but was I ever disappointed in the taste … the ginger was way too strong … even tho I’m not in the habit of throwing food away – this never made it to the table …
This was *gorgeous*!! The veggies – quite seasonal – were a perfect antidote to the richness of the Christmas leftovers.
How would these store in the fridge for 3-5 days? Will the veggies get soggy or lose its crunch? I will store the dressing in another container obviously. Thanks :)
It stays pretty crunchy. :) Cabbage is great like that!
Whoa, this is seriously delicious and I devoured it with the abandon usually reserved for less healthy foods. Even my 18-month-old is bonkers for this and keeps begging “more, more”! The dressing is very forgiving too as I was out of tamari (GF soy sauce alternative) and had to sub GF teriyaki. Also had no tahini but no matter, still tasted great! If you have to use teriyaki, there is generally already sugar and honey in the recipe so you may want to lighten up on the honey in the dressing recipe.
Loved this salad I doubled the recipe since I’m vegan and eat a ton of salad so yummy ! :) replaced the cabbage with romaine and replaced the honey in the sauce with sugar vegan it up :) would highly recommend this!!!!
My SO made this last night, paired with the honey siracha chicken and it was fantastic. We only tossed what we ate with the dressing so that it wouldn’t get soggy as leftovers. I normally am not a big fan of cabbage, but I couldn’t get enough. I do think it’s a salad for cilantro lovers, which I am.
I’d really like to try a variation on this, because I don’t like cilantro. Do you think it would work with parsley, instead?
No, parsley definitely isn’t the right flavor profile here. I think it would still be great without the cilantro and no substitute. The dressing has quite a bit of flavor, so it won’t be bland. :)
I did put flat parsley in mine I really loved it but I love parsley
My family doesn’t like cilantro (I know, I know) so I threw a large handful of baby arugula in there instead and the peppery crunch plays nicely with the rest of the flavors.
This was inedible. Looked great, but no one on this end enjoyed it. Have a backup meal in mind if you make this.
This is fantastic. I was wary about the red cabbage because usually I don’t like it raw but I let it sit in the dressing for a few minutes. The dressing is great as well!
Thank you Beth for yet another excellent recipe. This salad is part of my regular cuisine. I entertain often and every time I offer this salad, people love it… and I direct them to budgetbytes.com for more :)
Not my favorite. It’s not so much the recipe, but the cabbage is so tough that it makes the salad hard to eat. Also I would mix in the peanuts as you need them…they get a little soggy in the fridge.
We made this with sesame chicken and I did slightly change the dressing as I didn’t want to pay $7.00+ dollars for tahini. I used peanut butter and that worked pretty well. Again everyone enjoyed both dishes. I also thought you could turn this into a main dish by adding pineapple, red pepper and some rotisierre chicken (spelling may be off). Like a Tai Chicken salad.
Thank you again.
Can you use a Napa cabbage. I’m not a big fan of red cabbage.
Yep!
This salad was wonderful! I love love colorful plates. I added a cut up grilled pork chop for a complete meal – so good. I used Kraft Asian toasted sesame dressing because it’s my current fav.
Thank you!
Amazing………..keep ’em coming!
This salad is freaking amazing. In a quest to eat better and lose some weight, I’ve been eating some boring lunches lately, but I was so looking forward to this that I polished it off by 11:45 AM. I didn’t have tahini for the dressing, but I jsut put an extra splash of sesame oil and it was amazing.
I’ll have to skip the peanuts but I want to make this for my bento! :)
I used this as the first recipe to take my new food processor out for a spin!
It almost became pesto. But fortunately I stopped myself before the power completely took me over and ended up with a wonderful salad!
I love love love this recipe! I add grilled chicken. Perfect for this summer heat!
added some simple grilled chicken to this and made it a jar salad for work portability – stayed good in my jar for a week! http://lifehacker.com/5857420/make-salad-in-a-jar-for-an-easy-grab+and+go-lunch-that-stays-fresh-for-days
The colours are really amazing. And the salad looks so delicious
I have been eating this for days. I am obsessed with it! I just finished my last bowl (the sadness) and was waiting all morning until it was long enough past breakfast to justify eating lunch. I could eat this for the rest of my life. THANK YOU!!!!! lol
This salad is really lovely. We had it today. I used Newman’s Own lite sesame ginger dressing. Very nice. Thanks for all of your beautiful, easy, and budget friendly recipes!
I will SO be making this – I love a good balanced meal! :) P.S. – You could mix this salad with some cooked noodles and chicken for another complete meal!
I will SO be making this – I love a good balanced meal! :) P.S. – You could mix this salad with some cooked noodles and chicken for another complete meal!
I absolutely love that this is a crunch Asian salad without those disgusting little wormy fried noodle things! This looks delicious, and I can’t wait to try that ginger-sesame dressing.
This looks so good, like one of the most visually appealing mayo-free cole slaw recipes I’ve seen. Everything in this salad sounds delicious, and I will definitely have to bookmark this one for later.
Looks fantastic! If you are going to be eating it throughout the week (as it sounds like you do?), would you say that the veggies are robust enough that they can be stored with the dressing, or do you think it’s better to store them separately and put dressing just on how much you’re going to eat at that time? Can’t wait to try it next week!
Melissa – Cashews, almonds, even some shelled edamame!
Looks great! What do you think would be a good substitute for the peanuts?
yum! I love asian inspired coleslaws. So tasty and fresh! I’ve made one similar to this and I just added a little bit of sriracha for some heat! So good!!!