Tchoukchouka
When we were visiting Galimard, one of the perfume factories in Grasse, our guide was an adorable young French girl with huge hazel eyes named Cyrielle Charpentier. After we finished the tour, learning about the flowers from around Grasse that go into perfumes, Cyrielle let us try some of the essences. Noticing a chai, the Jewish symbol for “life,” on a chain around her neck, we asked her if she was Jewish, and she said that she was. Her father, a Holocaust survivor, and her mother, an Italian Jew who also suffered during the war, lived near Grasse. When I asked her what foods she liked, she immediately named her grandmother’s tchoukchouka, a North African dish with tomatoes, peppers, and sometimes eggplant. The purists’ versions of tchoukchouka, this salade cuite, include lots of garlic and no onions, but I have seen some with onions as well. The beauty of this delicious recipe is that it is prepared in advance and tastes even better the next day, especially helpful for the Sabbath and other Jewish holidays, when cooking is prohibited and there is little time to prepare food—you do not have to fuss with a last-minute salad. It can also be used as a base for an egg or sausage dish, and is great as a sauce over pasta.
Recipe information
Yield
8 servings
Ingredients
Preparation
Step 1
Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Pierce the eggplant all over with a fork, and put it on a baking pan. Roast for about 20 minutes, or until soft, turning once. Allow to cool before scooping the pulp from the eggplant (discard the skin).
Step 2
On another baking sheet, roast the peppers for 20 minutes. When cool enough to handle, peel them, removing the seeds and any white pith from the peppers. Then cut them into large dice.
Step 3
If using fresh tomatoes, bring a pot of water to a boil. Plunge the tomatoes into the boiling water for a minute or two, remove with a slotted spoon, and cool in a bowl of ice water. When they are cool enough to handle, peel and dice, keeping most of the liquid but discarding the skin.
Step 4
Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan. Add the garlic, and cook for a minute or two, until fragrant but not burned. Stir in the eggplant, peppers, and tomatoes, cooking very slowly, uncovered, for about 1 hour, or until almost all the liquid has been evaporated, stirring occasionally and adding additional oil if needed.
Step 5
Season with salt and pepper to taste and, if you think it is needed, add sugar.
Step 6
Cool, and sprinkle lemon juice over all. Serve sprinkled with the cilantro.
