Skip to main content
Wellspent Market founder Jim Dixon has been writing about food and restaurants for Willamette Week for a long time. He wants our readers to eat well, and he shows them how with the recipes he creates just for us by using simple cooking techniques and easy-to-find ingredients.
Summer tastes like eggplant, peppers and tomatoes. The cultures around the Mediterranean, where summer lasts longer than it does here in the PNW, put those flavors together better than anyone, probably because they add a lot of good olive oil. Turkish imam bayildi and melitzanosalata from Greece, Lebanese salatet rahib, Bulgarian kyopolou, and the mesaka’a from Egypt all combine eggplant, peppers, and tomatoes in some delicious form.
The combo I’ve been eating at least once a week during our summer comes close to zaalouk, what food writer Paula Wolfert calls “one of the best of all cooked Moroccan salads.” Classic zaalouk combines the already cooked eggplant with fresh tomatoes and cooks them together again. The result is a dip-like salad, often eaten on the garlicky semolina Berber flat bread called amazigh aghram. My zaalouk-inspired salad adds ripe roasted peppers and fresh, preferably homegrown, tomatoes.
I’ve cooked the eggplant a few different ways to make this. I’ve burned it over a gas burner (before I switched to induction), roasted it both whole and halved (cut side down in a slick of olive oil), and blackened it over fire. But most often I peel a big eggplant (the skin can get tough) and cut it into thick chunks, which get tossed with oil and spices and roasted in a hot oven; they’re done when the insides are creamy and the exterior has a gently spicy crust.
I do the peppers at the same time, although they take a little longer. I use shears to trim the stem flush, then stand them up in a very lightly oiled skillet. After 50–60 minutes in the oven, the skins get brown and a little blistered (they don’t need to be completely blackened), then I cool and peel them. The old school technique of putting the hot roasted peppers in a bag to steam isn’t necessary; once they’re cool enough to handle the skins slip right off.
Cilantro is the classic herb for zaalouk, but I have pots of arugula and mint in my driveway garden, both hardy perennials that provide herb all year. Parsley works, too.
Recipe
- 1 large globe eggplant
- ¼ cup extra virgin olive oil + 2 tablespoons
- 1 tablespoon ground cumin
- 2 teaspoon smoked paprika
- 2-3 bell peppers, red, yellow, orange or a combination
- 2-4 ripe tomatoes, cut into bite-sized pieces
- 3 cloves fresh garlic, chopped
- A big handful of fresh herbs such as arugula, mint, cilantro or parsley, chopped
- 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
- Kosher-style sea salt
Peel the eggplant, cut into quarters lengthwise, and slice into 1 inch thick pieces. Put the pieces in a bowl and toss with the two tablespoons of olive oil, cumin and smoked paprika. Roast in an oven at 350F until the exteriors are browned and the insides tender, about 40-50 minutes. When they’re cool, cut the chunks into halves or quarters.
Trim the stems from the peppers so they’ll stand up and roast in a separate skillet or on a baking sheet. After an hour the skins should be starting to get brown and slightly blistered. Remove and let cool, then hold them over the skillet while you use your fingers to slip the papery outer skin off. I often pull the stem and seed core first to minimize the pepper seeds, but it’s okay to get some in the salad. Just don’t rinse the peppers under water; that strips away lots of flavor. You want to add the juice in the pepper roasting pan to the salad.
Cut the peppers into strips, then in shorter, bite-sized lengths. Combine the eggplant, peppers, tomatoes, garlic and herbs with the rest of the olive oil and the red wine vinegar in a large bowl. Mix well and taste, adding a bit more salt or vinegar if needed. I think this tastes best at room temperature.
