Tunisian Salade Mechouia Recipes

Steps:

• 1. Recipe Method: 1) Grill the red peppers until the skins are blackended. If you have a gas stove you can char the skins over one of the rings. Set aside then peel and core when they are cool enough to handle.
• 2. 2) Meanwhile place the chilli, garlic and tomatoes in a roasting dish and roast in a hot oven until the garlic is soft. You can remove the skins from the tomatoes and de-seed the chilli at this point if you wish.
• 3. 3) Place all the vegetables in a blender or food processor - alternatively strain through a sieve.
• 4. 4) Gently heat the caraway seeds and oil in a frying pan until fragrant. Then add to the vegetables and whiz to a paste.
• 5. 5) Chill before serving. Serve in a bowl with quarters of hard boiled eggs, chunks of tuna fish or black olives.

Steps:

• Prepare a grill to medium-high heat.
• Thread garlic cloves onto a metal skewer. Put garlic skewer, tomatoes, onions, peppers, chile, and eggplant on grill rack. Grill, turning occasionally, until tender and lightly charred all over, 6-7 minutes for garlic and tomatoes; 10 minutes for eggplant; 15 minutes for peppers and chile; 20 minutes for onions.
• Place peppers and chile in a large bowl; cover with plastic wrap and let stand 15 minutes.
• Coarsely chop tomatoes and eggplant. Peel and coarsely chop onions. Peel garlic cloves. Peel, seed, and coarsely chop peppers and chile.
• Place all vegetables in a food processor, along with oil, pulsing until pureed to desired consistency. Transfer to a large bowl. Season to taste with lemon juice, salt, and pepper.

Steps:

• Seed bell peppers,place in pan and set to broil for roughly 5 minutes on each side. You can also wrap the peppers in tin foil to minimize charring. 10 minutes into the bell pepper broiling, add the tomatoes to the pan. 15 minutes into the broiling, add the chilies and garlic clove into the pan. Remove the lot from the broiler and let cool. Meanwhile, hard boil the eggs. Next, carefully peel any charred skin off the tomatoes, bell peppers and chilies. Once peeled, and cooled enough to no longer be steaming, place the lot in a blender and stir, or chop, depending on your equipment, to a chunky-puree consistency, perhaps 10 seconds. Season with salt to taste. Pour contents into a bowl and drizzle olive oil all over the surface so that there is a thin film of oil atop the mechouia. (The olive oil dampens the spiciness somewhat.) Cover bowl with plastic wrap and place in refrigerator to chill for about 20 minutes. Once chilled sprinkle the tuna on top of the mechouia. Next, quarter the hard boiled eggs and decorate the top of the salad with both the eggs and olives. Serve at room temperature with pita or french bread. NB: You can adjust the spiciness by playing with the number of chilies you add to the mix. You can also, if you are so inclined and equipped, use a traditional mortar and pestle to pound the peppers instead of blending them.

Steps:

• Halve and de-seed the peppers; de-seed and finely chop one chili. Roughly chop the anchovies, if using.
• Place the whole eggplant(s) in a roasting tin and cook at 425F for 20min. Add unpeeled garlic, peppers and 2tbsp of the oil; season with salt.
• Cook for a further 30min. Cool, then skin and roughly chop peppers, garlic and eggplant.
• Return the vegetables to the roasting tin, then add the caraway seeds, chopped and whole chilis, lemon juice, capers and anchovies (if using). Season, then mix well and cook, uncovered, for 10-15min until the liquid has evaporated.
• Cool, sprinkle with chopped mint and serve at room temperature.