Last Updated on August 9, 2026 by Simon Fan
Popular in Asian stir-fries and noodle dishes, mung bean sprouts are great for making a refreshing salad on hot summer days.
Crunchy and juicy with a mild, earthy bean taste, they can be quickly blanched and tossed with a simple dressing. Or, you can include other ingredients to make the salad more substantial and suitable as a main course.
Here, I’m sharing a tasty combination of mung bean sprouts, pea shoots, and golden needle mushrooms (enoki). Together, they make a salad with layers of texture and flavor, plus a beautiful presentation.
Feel free to substitute golden needle mushrooms with beech mushrooms (shimeji) or thinly shredded oyster mushrooms. If pea shoots are unavailable, use spinach instead.
The key to this dish is blanching each ingredient separately until just cooked through. Shocking the vegetables in an ice bath or rinsing them under cold water helps preserve their color and texture, though it can also reduce some flavor and nutrients. In this recipe, I spread them in a single layer on a cold baking sheet so they cool quickly in the air; this works well because I’m not cooking a large batch.
Mung bean sprout salad with pea shoots and golden needle mushrooms
Serves 2
Ingredients
150 g mung bean sprouts, roots removed
150 g golden needle mushrooms (enoki), bottom parts trimmed
100 g pea shoots, cut into bite-size sections about 2 to 3 cm long
Sauce
2 teaspoons soy sauce
2 teaspoons white rice vinegar
¼ teaspoon sugar
⅛ teaspoon ground white pepper
1 teaspoon water
2 teaspoons sesame oil
2 teaspoons toasted white sesame seeds
Directions
- Bring a pot of water to a boil over high heat and season it with enough salt to taste like seawater. Blanch the mung bean sprouts until just cooked, about 40 seconds. Transfer them to a colander to drain well, then spread them on a cold baking sheet to cool.
- Blanch the mushrooms for about 1 minute, then drain and cool them the same way.
- Repeat with the pea shoots, blanching them for about 30 seconds.
- While the vegetables and mushrooms cool, mix all the sauce ingredients in a small bowl.
- Combine the cooled ingredients in a large bowl. If desired, chill them briefly before serving, then toss with the sauce, sprinkle with sesame seeds, and serve.
