"DUNKING SALADS" ARE GAZPACHO’S FIRST COUSIN

 If you’re a field hand working in the Andalusian sun, you need a midday meal that’s both refreshing and restorative. Gazpacho is the answer. Set a big bowl in the shade. Mash up day-old bread with olive oil and garlic. Add whatever vegetables or fruits are to hand. That might be tomatoes, cucumbers, and peppers to make a very classic Andalusian gazpacho, or regional variations such as cucumber and lettuce (no tomatoes); oranges, lettuce, and figs; lemons (zoque); almonds (ajo blanco). Add a little cool spring water to make a soupy “salad”. Everyone gathers around to eat out of the bowl. Some variants are even called “liquid salad,” such as lechuga en caldo or lettuce in “broth” (cold water). 

This dunking salad, or mojete, is made with roasted eggplant. 

A “dunking salad” is gazpacho in reverse. Called moje, mojete, or remojón, this gazpacho cousin is a juicy salad either served over pieces of bread or accompanied with bread for soaking in the salad juices. Vegetables or fruits, washed with liquid still clinging, are chunked up in a bowl with garlic, extra virgin olive oil, vinegar, and salt. The salt draws the juices out of the ingredients. Chunks of bread are either added to the mix or used for dipping. Many include hard-cooked eggs and chunks of salt cod or canned tuna. With lots of bread, they make a filling meal.

In my latest cookbook, FLAVORS OF AL-ANDALUS, The Culinary Legacy of Spain (Hippocrene Books), I include a whole section on gazpacho, salmorejo (thick gazpacho), and dunking salads. The recipes—with no tomatoes or peppers!—can trace their roots to Moorish Spain. Here is one of the recipes in that section. (See below for links to more dunking salads.)

Roasted Eggplant Salad with Chickpeas

Mojete con Berenjena y Garbanzos

Make this mojete at least an hour before serving so that the salt begins to draw out the juices of the vegetables. If possible, chill the mixture. The salad makes a good starter or snack. Serve it with bread, for dunking, scooping, sopping. Unless you’re eating out in the campo (countryside), you’ll probably want spoons or forks as well. 

The eggplant for this salad can be roasted on a grill, in the oven, or in the microwave. 

                                                     (Photo Daniel Searl)

2 eggplants (about 1 pound each)

1 onion

1 head of garlic

1 tablespoon white wine vinegar

Salt

1 cup cooked and drained chickpeas

1 tablespoon drained capers

1 radish, chopped

3 tablespoons lemon juice

½ teaspoon cumin

3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

2 tablespoons chopped parsley

Salad greens

Bread for serving

1 or 2 hard-cooked eggs

4 ounces fresh goat cheese, sliced (optional)

Pitted black olives

Preheat oven to 400ºF.

Place the eggplants and onion in an oven pan. Slice the top off of the head of garlic, wrap it in foil and place in the pan with the eggplants. Roast the eggplants, onion and garlic until eggplants are tender when pierced with a skewer, 45 to 60 minutes. Allow them to cool.

Scoop out eggplant flesh.

Split the eggplants and scoop out the flesh. Discard the skins. Cut or tear the eggplant into strips and place in a bowl. Add the vinegar and 1 teaspoon of salt. 

Remove onion skin and slice the roasted onion in strips, from stem to root end. Combine with the eggplant. Add the chickpeas, capers, and radish.

Unwrap the roasted garlic and discard foil. Squeeze the head of garlic to extract the soft flesh of the individual cloves into a small bowl. Mash the pulp with a fork. Stir in 1 teaspoon of salt, the lemon juice, and cumin. Whisk in the oil until the dressing is emulsified. Stir in 1 tablespoon of the parsley.

Line a shallow bowl or platter with salad greens. (Optional: lay slices of bread on the platter as a bed for the eggplant salad.) Arrange the eggplant-chickpea salad on the greens. Place quartered eggs, sliced cheese, if using, and olives on top of the salad. Sprinkle with remaining parsley. Serve with bread for dunking.

More recipes for dunking salads:

Orange and Cod Salad (Remojón) 

Chopped Salad with Fava Beans  

 Lemon Dunking Salad 

Tomato-Tuna Dunking Salad 

Potato-Orange Dunking Salad 

Chopped Tomato Salad (Pipirrana de Jaén)

 Did you know that eggplant is the signature food of Moorish Spain? In Flavors of al-Andalus you will find seven very different recipes for eggplant--in season now--from this Roasted Eggplant Salad to stuffed, in croquettes, pickled, stewed, baked in a timbale, and fried and drizzled with molasses! 
 

This cookbook explores the fascinating story of the deep and lasting influences that Islamic culture has left on modern Spanish cooking. 

Author and Spanish cooking expert Janet Mendel tells the story of the Moorish influence on Spanish cooking through 120 recipes and photographs for modern-day dishes, from salads and vegetables to fish, poultry and meat to sweets and pastries, that trace their heritage to foods served in medieval times.  (Hippocrene Books)    

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FAREWELL TO FAVAS

The last of the fava beans.

Only a handful of fava beans remains to be picked in my garden patch. I’m usually inundated with them, but this year I only planted a few. There’s never enough maturing at the same time to make a satisfying serving. 

On a TV food show I watched a segment filmed in a tapas bar in Jamilena, a town in Jaén province (Andalusia). The cook was making a variation of pipirrana, a chopped “salad,” called “machacao,” that was finished with a scattering of raw fava beans. Machacao is Andaluz for “machacado,” meaning "crushed." The dressing is prepared by crushing egg yolks, garlic, green pepper, bread and olive oil in a mortar or in a wooden bowl called a dornillo.

The pipirrana of Jaén is more of a mojete or remojón—what I call “dunking salad,” meant to be served with lots of bread for sopping up the juices. Pipirrana is usually a summer dish, a relative of gazpacho, served chilled for a light supper. In the springtime, before tomatoes are in season, some of the tomatoes are replaced with oranges. The favas are another springtime touch.

Chopped salad is topped with chunks of tuna and fava beans. 

A "dunking salad," meant to be served with chunks of bread for soaking up the garlicky dressing and tomato juices.

With tuna and egg as well as bread, the salad makes a complete meal.

Blanch and peel favas.

Freshly-picked fava beans can be eaten raw with just a sprinkling of salt. However, they’re best if, after shelling, they are briefly blanched in boiling water and the outer skins of the beans are removed. No favas? Use fresh peas instead, raw, if they are freshly picked, or blanched if they’ve been waiting in a grocery store bin. 

Add the juices from chopping tomatoes and oranges to the salad. Allow the salad to stand 30 minutes to further draw out the juices. If desired, add a little cold water to make it even soupier. Serve the salad with a spoon and chunks of bread for dunking. 

The “mashed” dressing is really garlicky! You could decrease the quantity of garlic or blanch several cloves of garlic to make them less intrusive.

Use as much canned tuna as you like to top the salad. For this quantity of tomatoes and mashed dressing I used two 70-gram cans. 

For an authentic Jaén pipirrana, you would use a good Picual extra virgin olive oil, a fruity oil with a piquant finish.

Chopped Salad with Fava Beans

Machacao con Habas

Orange as well as tomatoes in this springtime salad.

1 cup shelled fava beans

1 slice bread

2 cloves garlic, coarsely chopped

1 teaspoon coarse salt 

2 hard-boiled eggs

1 green pepper

1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil

2 cups peeled and chopped tomatoes

1 cup chopped orange (optional)

½ cup diced cucumber (optional)

3 tablespoons chopped scallions 

Salt to taste

Water (optional)

Canned tuna

Bread, to serve

Blanch the fava beans in boiling water for 15 seconds. Drain them and refresh under cold water. Slit the outer skins and gently squeeze out the beans. Discard skins. Reserve the beans.

Soak the bread in water to cover until it is softened. Squeeze out the water and discard the crusts. Reserve ¼ cup of mashed bread pulp. 

Mash garlic, bread and egg yolks in mortar. 

Place the garlic in a mortar or wooden bowl with the coarse salt. Grind and crush the garlic until smooth. Peel the eggs and separate the yolks and whites. Add the yolks to the mortar and reserve the whites. 

Use a vegetable peeler to peel some of the green pepper. Cut a 2-inch piece of pepper, chop it, and add to the mortar. Reserve the remaining pepper. Add the pulped bread to the mortar. 

Mash the bread, egg yolks and green pepper with the garlic to make a paste. Using the pestle, stir a spoonful of oil into the paste until it is absorbed. Add another spoonful. Continue adding oil and stirring until the sauce is thickened and emulsified. 

Chopped tomato, orange, pepper and egg whites.

Chop the reserved egg whites. Chop enough reserved green pepper to make 2/3 cup. Place whites and pepper in a bowl. Add the tomatoes, orange and cucumber, if using. Add the scallions. Gently stir in the garlic sauce. Taste and add salt if needed.

Chill the salad, if desired. Otherwise, allow to stand 30 minutes. To serve, place the salad in a bowl and top with chunks of drained tuna. Scatter reserved fava beans on top. Serve the salad accompanied by bread. 

More recipes with fava beans here.

More versions of pipirrana:

Fresh Tomato and Pepper Salad.

Gazpacho Salad.

Moroccan Chopped Tomato Salad.

More "dunking" salads (mojetes) here.