I ride public transit a lot. To appointments, to markets, to work. It gives me a lot of time to think. And the one thing that tends to float around in my head is food (shocking, I know haha). Today on the way home from work, I was thinking of tonight’s salad. I spent a lot of time on my feet, so I wanted to do something quick and largely off my feet. It was a cooler day today so I roasted some peppers. While I had the peppers doing their thing in the oven, I was able to sit and halve and pit some cherries. Those two together were the beginning of an antipasto idea where cherries took the place of savoury olives. I finished it with some Hungarian turos cheese (a crumbly, homemade dry cottage cheese). Relatively quick (a bit of downtime roasting and waiting for the peppers to cool so they could be seeded and peeled) and plated without much fuss.
Roasted Pepper, Cherry and Turos Salad
For the Roasted Peppers
4 large sweet bell peppers
Preheat oven to 190C/400F.
Line a pan with foil. Place the peppers on the pan and roast in the preheated oven for 35-40 minutes or until blackened on the skin. Remove from the pan immediately with tongs and place in a bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and allow the steam to loosen the skins from the peppers (about 15-20 minutes). Peel away the skin and remove the stem and seeds. Tear into strips and set aside.
For the salad:
10 cherries, halved and pitted
1/3 cup Hungarian turos cheese (or a dry cottage cheese. Or feta if you want a sharper flavoured cheese)
Reserved Roasted Peppers
On four plates, scatter some roasted peppers over each plate. Spread out some cherry halves around the roasted peppers with a few cherry halves in the centre. Crumble with cheese lightly. Serves 3-4.
Cute little salad!
Thanks! I’ve been enjoying a lot of cherries lately and putting them in all kinds of dishes 🙂