“Rostov” Salad
This southern preserve is easy to memorize: nearly every vegetable — eggplant, tomatoes, peppers, onions, carrots, and apples — is taken exactly five of each. But the real trick isn’t the arithmetic. The eggplant is first fried in rounds until golden and only then stewed with everything else, and that pre-frying is what gives the salad a deeper, almost mushroom-like flavor you won’t get from tossing raw vegetables into a pot.
Small tricks
Soak the eggplant rounds in salted water before frying; it draws out bitterness and cuts how much oil they drink up in the pan. Grated apple and carrot bring natural sweetness and a light tartness, so very little sugar is needed. Add the garlic only 10 minutes before the end, since long cooking strips its fresh aroma. Mind the pot across the full 40–50 minutes: stir it and lower the heat if needed so the bottom doesn’t scorch. The batch yields about 2.5–3 liters (roughly 3 quarts).
Serve chilled as a rich appetizer, and keep the sealed jars somewhere cool.
Part of Ukrainian cuisine — 286 more recipes in the section.
You might also like
Ingredients
Instructions
Cut the eggplant into rounds, soak in salted water, and fry on both sides in sunflower oil.
Cut the tomatoes, peppers, and onion into rings or half-rings.
Coarsely grate the carrot and apples. Mix everything together.
Add a cup of sunflower oil, salt, sugar, and ground black pepper to taste. Cook, stirring, for 40-50 minutes.
Ten minutes before it's done, add the garlic.
Seal in sterilized jars. Makes 2.5-3 liters of salad.
Reviews
There are no reviews yet.