Still Biergarten weather in/near Berlin for the coming days. Here comes another summer or Biergarten classic at casa zwick. I make this salad quite often when I have the chance to find high-quality tomatoes, as it is such a refreshing&wonderful dish in summer times. In the deep south of Germany or Lake of Constance (border to Switzerland) where I come from this dish is a must-served in summer times.
The greatness of this dish lies in its simplicity or less is more. The secret besides the ripe&sweet tomatoes is the red onion and the cooling of the salad. AND salt.
Ingredients
800-1000g tomatoes
1 red onion
3 tbsp vinegar (me: high quality Aceto Balsamico)
10 tbsp olive oil
salt&pepper
Preparation
Chopp the tomatoes and put in a bowl
Then add chopped onion in little cubes or in thinly slices to the tomatoes
Also add salt&pepper
In addition vinegar&olive oil
Combine everything and put in the fridge for 2-3h or longer with lid
Remove from the fridge 15min before serving. Serve with baguette&bread and a chilled Rosé. ENJOY
Would you use white balsamic?
[ducks waiting for the scorn of Jay]
I’m. Guessing the answer to questions about Basil etc is the quality of the tomatoes. With store bought tomatoes I’d absolutely put a little basil in there.
I made it tonight for dinner. I forgot to add the basil but I added a couple of tiny mozz balls because that was easy. I used Nola’s Olive Oil and Nola’s sherry vinegar. Worked great.
Let me quote 2 people from Great Britain who also made this dish/recipe last night:
“Delicious. I gave it a full 3 hours in fridge but served straight from fridge. Next time might take it out 15 mins before. But a cracking, simple summer salad.” Tom Cannavan
“Took it out fifteen minutes beforehand as it was the obvious thing to do. The big surprise is how everything is somehow sweeter. I used a mix not dissimilar to the one Andrew shows. Heritage box from Isle of Wight.
I’m wondering if the vinegar and salt mix sucks the sugar out of the red onion?”
Essentially a greek tomato salad without the cucumber or feta. I love this prep, particularly the red onion. I like the onion sliced very thinly, so you don’t get chunks that overpower the tomatoes. I think the process is essentially just a very quick, light pickling.
I agree, the onions are a little bit too big this time. Normally I cut them thinner or in very little cubes.
Just for the record, I also like to add basil when I make the Tuscan version together with Ciabatta. Really great. But this version is German and benefits from NO basil.
Or sometimes I add aragula/rocket, as we have a lot of spciy aragula in the garden. Much much better version than from the supermarket. But this is also a different kind of animal.