This colorful salad, popular in Cáceres in western Spain, makes a great starter, light lunch, or midnight snack. Do not confuse it with zarangollo, a dish from Murcia that features stewed zucchini and scrambled eggs.
Ingredients
- 3 red, yellow, or orange bell peppers, or a mix
- 4 Roma tomatoes
- 1 small head of garlic, the top removed
- Extra virgin olive oil
- Coarse salt (kosher or sea) and freshly ground black pepper
- Best quality sherry or red wine vinegar
- A few leaves of Bibb, Boston, or romaine lettuce, washed and dried (optional)
- 1/2 small sweet onion, peeled and sliced lengthwise into thin strips
- 2 hard-cooked eggs, peeled and quartered lengthwise
- 2 to 4 slices crusty bread, sliced on a diagonal and toasted
Directions
Step 1
Heat the oven to 400°F. Arrange the peppers and tomatoes, cut sides down, on a rimmed sheet pan. Drizzle with extra virgin olive oil and season with salt and pepper, then loosely wrap the garlic in a square of aluminum foil (to keep it from burning), drizzle the garlic with olive oil, and place in a corner of the pan. Roast for 30 minutes, or until the vegetables soften. Let cool.
Step 2
Working over a shallow bowl, peel and seed the peppers and tomatoes. Reserve the juices.
Step 3
Cut the peppers into strips; dice the tomatoes. Combine, adding the reserved juices. Unwrap the garlic and squeeze 2 or 3 softened garlic cloves into the pepper-and-tomato mixture. Season with salt and pepper and mash lightly with the back of a wooden spoon. Drizzle with a liberal amount of olive oil and vinegar to taste.
Step 4
Divide the lettuce leaves, if using, between two chilled shallow bowls. Top with the pepper-and- tomato mixture and the onions, then add an egg to each bowl, along with a piece or two of toasted bread (also drizzled with olive oil) and the remainder of the roasted garlic (2 or 3 cloves per plate). Serve chilled or at room temperature.
Serves 2