Turkish Çoban Salad with Tuna & Sumac
Shepherd's salad cut properly small, with the oil from the tuna tin doing half the dressing.
Why it works
Çoban salad lives or dies on the size of the dice — everything cut to roughly a centimetre so one forkful carries tomato, cucumber, pepper and onion at once, not one thing at a time. Tuna packed in olive oil brings its own seasoned fat, so tipping the tin in whole rather than draining it saves a step and adds savour.
Method
- Put the onion in the serving bowl with the lemon juice, vinegar, sumac, dried mint and a good pinch of salt. Leave it while you chop — ten minutes takes the bite out and turns it pink.
- Dice the tomatoes, cucumber and pepper on one board, small and even, and add them to the bowl with any juice left behind.
- Tip in the tuna and its oil, breaking it into large flakes rather than shredding, then add the beans and the olive oil.
- Fold it over twice with a big spoon. Taste: it should be noticeably sour and properly salted.
- Fold two-thirds of the torn flatbread through and give it 3 minutes to drink the juice at the bottom of the bowl. Tuck the rest in around the edge dry, for the contrast.
- Scatter over the parsley, crumbled cheese and a last pinch of sumac, and take the bowl to the table.
For the toddler
Take their tomato, cucumber and a little pepper straight off the board at step 2, before any of it meets the dressing bowl. Keep the feta and the olives off, since both are salt through and through, and rinse a spoonful of tuna to lose some of the tin's salt. Crush a few beans with a fork, cut the pepper into soft strips rather than dice, and soften their bread in a little oil.
How the toddler notes workChef’s notes
Tinned sardines or mackerel in olive oil, or leave the fish out and double the beans and cheese.
Leave out the beans and the whole thing lands at eleven minutes.
Thick yoghurt beaten with garlic and salt, and a plate of olives with long green chillies.
Two days chilled. It weeps, which is fine — the juice at the bottom is the best part.