Shopska Salad (Bulgarian Shopska salad)

Name: Shopska Salad (Bulgarian Shopska salad)
Prep time: 15 min
Total time: 15 min
Yield: 2 servings
Cuisine: Bulgarian
Ingredients: tomato 220 g; cucumber 160 g; green bell pepper 100 g; onion 50 g; feta cheese 80 g; olive oil 1.5 tbsp; red wine vinegar 1 tbsp

Quick answer

Total time: 15 min
Level: Easy
Servings: 2 servings
Ingredients: 7

About this dish

Finely grated feta covers chopped tomato, cucumber, green pepper, and onion like a layer of snow in Bulgaria's best-known salad.

There is no separate dressing: juice from ripe tomatoes mixes with the olive oil and red wine vinegar and becomes the sauce at the bottom of the bowl. Green pepper's grassy bitterness keeps the salty cheese and watery vegetables from tasting one-note. The feta brings plenty of salt on its own, so the vegetables get only a light seasoning to start. Scraping out the cucumber's seed section means less water diluting that sauce, and tossing right before eating keeps the vegetables firm.

Ingredients

servings

IngredientAmount

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Instructions

6 steps

1

Cut the 220 g tomato into generous bite-size pieces so the juice stays mostly inside each piece.

Halve the cucumber, scrape out the watery seed section, and cut it to a similar size for cleaner texture.
2

Remove the seeds and pale ribs from the 100 g green bell pepper, then slice it thinly enough to mix evenly.

Cut the 50 g onion smaller so its sharpness does not dominate any single bite.
3

Place the tomato, cucumber, pepper, and onion in a large bowl.

Mix gently without pressing until the feta is added.
4

Pour 1.5 tablespoons olive oil and 1 tablespoon red wine vinegar around the edge of the bowl rather than dumping them in one spot.

Toss gently from bottom to top so the tomatoes do not crush.
5

Check the bottom of the bowl after tossing.

There should be a small amount of tomato juice mixed with oil and vinegar; taste that liquid first, and add more salt only if it still seems flat.
6

Transfer the vegetables to a serving plate and finely grate the 80 g feta over the top in a thick layer.

Serve cold immediately, before the vegetables soften and before too much liquid collects underneath.