I love one pot dishes. Working late hours and trying to exercise after work leave little time for cooking during the week. My go-to is usually soup, but now that it is summer, I find myself scrambling to find new ideas. My usual requirements is that I can make it in one big batch, I don’t need to do anything extra when its time to eat, and it is on the healthier side. One that I learned from my husband is jaiva.
What is jaiva?
What is jaiva? It is basically a cold salad made with imitation crab. What are jaiva ingredients? The jaiva salad is basically a ceviche recipe with the raw fish or shrimp replaced with imitation crab. The imitation crab is broken apart and mixed with finely diced cucumber, tomato, onion, avocado, and cliantro. After that, squeeze a heafy amount of fresh lime juice. I like to eat it on a tostada. This is a dish eaten cold which is perfect for the summer and is pretty easy to make. Simple right? See below for my jaiva recipe.
Low carb meal prep
I will usually make a large batch of the jaiva salad and keep it in my fridge for up to 3-5 days. Its an easy way to meal prep a low carb type meal. After 5 days, it starts looking a little funny because the fruits in the salad will start breaking down from the lime juice acidity. In addition, this is a high protein, low carb type dish. Similarly, you can make this with cooked shrimp or fish.
Jaiva on tostada with avocado
Lessons Learned:
- add salt at the end because the imitation crab has some saltiness already
- toss the mixture gently so that the avocado doesn’t get mushy
- use higher quality imitation crab that breaks apart easily
- 3 large roma tomatoes, chopped
- ½ large onion, chopped
- 1 cucumber, seeded and chopped
- 3 small avocados (or 1 large), cubed
- juice of 3 limes
- ½ cup cilantro, chopped
- 1 lb imitation crab meat, broken apart into small pieces or shredded
- salt to taste
- tostadas for serving
- optional: cilantro, avocado, salsa of choice for topping
- combine all ingredients except tostadas into large bowl, and toss together. Add salt to taste. Refrigerate for 1 hr to let flavor blend.
- Spoon imitation crab mixture onto tostada. Top or garnish with cilantro or avocado. I like to add Cholula on top.
