A few months ago, I purchased these colorful soy wrappers to make sushi handrolls after tasting them during a demo. Made of soy, these are not the traditional seaweed nori wrappers used for sushi. However, they are very fun and versatile.
These wrappers are also very healthy, with the colors obtained through natural fruit and vegetable dies. You can see them with salads, fish and rice, etc. I decided I wanted to make some sort of noodle salad. There is a Japanese noodle dish often eaten cold using soba noodles. However, I didn’t have any soba noodles in the house, and I’m not a particularly big fan of the buckwheat based noodles.
My next idea was using ramen noodles. I’m not quite sure where I got this idea, but it sounded yummy. However, at the last minute, I decided to go a healthier route, leaning more towards a cold appetizer-type noodle: shirataki noodles.
You may have heard of shirtaki noodles. They started becoming quite popular in the US a few years ago, especially among dieters. The noodles have about 20 calories, 0 grams of fat and 1g of carbohydrates per serving. They are made out of konjac, a type of Japanese yam. Shirataki noodles can be found in most Asian grocery stores.
A version mixed with tofu is produced by House. These can be found in some American grocery stores. I’ve seen them placed next to House’s tofu at several of my local grocery store. The tofu adds a little more calories and carbs, but it also makes the texture a little soft and more noodle-like. I prefer the version with the tofu added, and they even have them cut to look like pasta, with ones shaped like angel hair pasta, fettuccine, spaghetti and macaroni.
For my noodle salad, I used the tofu shirataki shaped like angel hair pasta. I’ve had these noodles both hot and cold before, so I knew that a cold version would work well in my salad.
I did a quick boil to cook them and then soaked them in cold water to let them cool. Once they were ready, I added some vegetables which I also did a quick steam with (though you can serve it raw as well). I then tossed the noodle salad with a vinaigrette sauce.
I folded each of the wrappers, and used this ice cream cone holder as my handroll holder. When they were wrapped, I placed a small amount of salad into each one. Voila!
More Recipes to Try
Noodle Salad Handrolls
Ingredients
- 1 pack soy wrappers
- 1 pack tofu shirataki noodles
- 1/2 cup vegetables cut into small pieces I used broccoli and carrots
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- 1 tbsp vinegar
- pinch salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
- Bring a small pot of water to a oil. Open your package of noodles, and put noodles into the pot, boiling for about 1-2 minutes. Then run noodles under cold water and place in a bowl with cold water so that they cool.
- If you desire, you can do a quick steam of the vegetables as well, making sure not to overcook because you want them to remain crispy. Or you can leave them raw.
- To fold the soy wrappers, remove one wrapper and cut in half lengthwise. So each wrapper, you can actually make two rolls. With one of the halves, start from the bottom edge and form a large cone by have the bottom corner meet the middle of the sheet. Then wrap around the cone until no wrapper remains. Dab some water at the edge of the wrapper to seal the wrapper to the cone. Place in a holder. Repeat with remaining wrappers.
- Take your noodles and vegetables and place in a bowl. Toss with vinegar, olive oil, and salt and pepper. Then take a small portion and place into cone wrappers.
The nutrition information provided are only estimates based on an online nutritional calculator. I am not a certified nutritionist. Please consult a professional nutritionist or doctor for accurate information and any dietary restrictions and concerns you may have.
I love this post! I bought the soy wraps awhile ago from Nijiya but never got around using it. And I also bought the shirataki noodles and never used it either!
Can you explain the taste of the soy wrap and also the shirataki? Did the shirataki taste like noodles – or was it really strange tasting?
Hope your weekend went well!
The soy wrap doesn’t really have much of a taste. Shirataki noodles…mmm, they definitely don’t taste like regular pasta, but I like eating them. They have a firmer, harder texture. It’s a little bit like the glass noodles if they weren’t cooked until soft. That’s so funny you have both ingredients sitting around. This was really fun to make. I made them over that really hot weekend when I wasn’t in the mood to cook.
Great! I’m gonna use that for a fried sweet banana stuff.
Sounds delicious
Fabulous. I recently found a site that will deliver these soy wrappers to Spain, unfortunately they are still out of stock
Aw, that’s too bad. Did you try some other online sources? When I was writing this post, I found several sites selling them, though I don’t know where they ship to. Or have you tried looking for them in-store? I found them at my local Japanese store.