Corn and Green Bean Salad with Lime

I don't write a lot about vegetables; I'm clearly more of a sweets person. However, this bright, flavorful Corn and Green Bean Salad with Lime is too good not to share with you!

We love it. It's a warm, all-vegetable salad, made mainly from frozen vegetables, cooked over medium- to medium-high heat in a cast-iron skillet. It has a bright lime-soy dressing drizzled over it, which really makes the dish.

Ingredients

For Christmas 2017, I received Deb Perelman's Smitten Kitchen Every Day (affiliate link). We've liked all of the recipes I've tried from it. As I flipped through the salads, I saw a beautiful picture of a charred corn salad... which involved charring cobs of corn over a grill and cutting them from it. It seemed like a lot of effort, but I adapted it and have loved it ever since.

As a bonus, my changes made it weeknight-friendly and delicious in all seasons!

I decided to use frozen corn instead of cobs of corn for convenience. Same for frozen cut green beans. No need to thaw either. I use 12 ounce or 16 ounce bags, whatever I have around.

You can skip the grape tomatoes if you want, or just use chopped tomatoes, but they are a nice accent when they're in season. If all you have is canned tomatoes, skip them entirely.

Deb's salad has crispy shallots. I loved them. But the calories didn't make it friendly for an everyday meal, so I had to cut them. I replaced them with finely chopped, sauteed onions at the beginning of the dish, and cut out raw ones, which we simply don't like.

I cut back on the dressing, but even at this amount I often have some at the bottom of our plates. I cut fish sauce from Deb's original recipe and swapped in soy sauce. (I use lower sodium soy sauce here, just like in my Spicy Pork with Asparagus or Soy-Cola Braised Pork recipes.)

Brown sugar and lime juice round out the dressing. Although I do use fresh lime juice in my Steak Salad with Lime and Cashews, I think bottled would be okay here, especially in a pinch.

You can use cilantro, mint, or basil as a garnish, or you can skip it.

Instructions

This is a true 30-minute meal, and there's very little to do in advance. Just finely mince your onion, and get started!

One: In a 12-inch cast iron skillet, heat the olive oil over medium to medium-high heat. Add the onion, and cook for 3-4 minutes without stirring, until it starts to brown. Then stir in the garlic and red pepper flakes.

Two: Stir in the frozen corn. It will thaw as it cooks. Let cook 4 minutes. If you don't stir it, it should brown, but stir it if necessary.

Three: Stir in green beans. Cook another 4-5 minutes, stirring occasionally if necessary.

Four: Meanwhile, combine lime juice, soy sauce, and brown sugar in a small bowl.

Five: Transfer the vegetables into a serving bowl. Add the tomatoes, pour over the dressing, and garnish with cilantro.

Enjoy immediately!

Serving and Storage

Serve immediately. We get 4 servings of this as a side. We usually have a thin steak or pork chop as our main dish with it, but serving it alongside seared shrimp makes for a super-healthy meal. In a pinch, it can serve two as a main dish salad for veggie lovers.

I've never tried it, but I bet it would be good over thin rice noodles as a summer pasta salad vibe.

You can refrigerate leftovers and eat them later. However, the lime juice in this will begin to lightly pickle the green beans; they're usually more of a dull green after they've been in the fridge. This is an aesthetic issue; I don't mind eating it this way.

Corn and Green Bean Salad with Lime FAQs

More Recipes with Soy Sauce

Here's a few of my other favorite dishes that take soy sauce.

More Recipes with Lime Juice

Here's a few of my other favorite recipes that take lime juice.

I hope this becomes a recipe you'll return to. If you try it, a star rating below helps others find it - and I'd love to hear how yours turns out in the comments! 💕 Questions or trouble? Drop a note, and I'll do my best to help.