Gentle Reader, While I’m closeted writing a novel I hope you’ll enjoy reading, it’s been suggested I post pieces from earlier years … years when I was freshly widowed, living in or near L.A. with my dog, waiting for Bill to appear. Do please bear with me!
A View from 15 years ago: Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Ajvar!
In one of my former lifetimes, I was asked to do an article on Serbian cuisine for a magazine. Truth to tell, I wasn’t sure where Serbia was — had to look it up on the map (yes, it was that long ago). I loved the food I learned about in my research — I’ve always been crazy about earthy Central European cooking. One of my favorite discoveries was Kaymak with Ajvar … bread spread with creamy fresh cheese topped with a piquant puree of roasted sweet peppers and eggplants.
Years passed, I forgot about it, then one day at Trader Joe’s I found imported jars of orangy-red ajvar on the shelf with the tapenades. Oh joy! Richly flavored and super-low in calories*, I went through a jar or two a week, smoothing ajvar (AY-var) on morning toast, lunchtime bread, nibbletime crackers. Then TJ’s dropped it. Oh no!
This weekend there’s a big reception in the family and I volunteered to do the food. I’ll make ajvar, says I to myself. I found luscious peppers and huge eggplants at Costco, and I prepared them last night watching “Masterpiece Contemporary” (excellent episode). It took me the full two hours, I’m afraid. One must peel the peppers — the skins are bitter. Peeling roasted peppers is a meditative act as are many tasks in cooking, and if one chooses to do it, there’s nothing for it but to do it with mindfulness — and the BBC.
This recipe is large but ajvar keeps at least a week in the fridge, and it would be simple to prepare a fraction of the amounts. If you want to be traditional, serve it with fresh creamy cheese. Alan Davidson’s “The Oxford Companion to Food” says kaymak is made with cow’s milk in Europe and the texture is comparable to clotted cream. The Serbian cook who gave me material for that article so long ago said it was fresh goat’s cheese. Doesn’t matter. It’s the play of mild-tasting creamy white against richly flavored creamy orange-red that’s splendid.
I will add this: last night after I finished, I was disappointed. The ajvar wasn’t as flavorful as when I dipped a spoon in this afternoon. So let it ripen before serving.
Something else. To my surprise, I seem to have stumbled on the perfect proportions because I can taste every element in the blend. Doesn’t happen often.
Serbian Spread of Roasted Sweet Red Peppers and Eggplants
(About 50 2-tablespoon servings)
1 cup flavorful olive oil
12 large fleshy sweet red peppers
2 very large or 3 medium eggplants
2 teaspoons minced garlic
1 tablespoon lemon juice
About ½ tablespoon salt
At least 1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Set one oven rack in the middle with a baking stone if you have one, set a second rack just above it. Heat the oven to 425 degrees. Brush 1 very large or 2 smaller baking sheets with 2 tablespoons of the oil. Slice peppers in half lengthwise, remove caps and seeds, fit halves cut sides down on the sheets. Slide sheets onto the middle rack. Pierce eggplants with a knife in several places and set whole on the top rack. Roast peppers until soft and edges are blackened, up to an hour. Stack pieces in a bowl, cover with plastic film, and let steam 15 minutes. Scrape off skins, setting pieces in a colander (juices would thin the spread). Continue roasting eggplants till collapsed—large fruits might take another half-hour. Cut open and scoop flesh into colander to drain.
Puree peppers in a food processor and measure. Puree eggplants and measure. My amounts were 4 cups pepper puree, 2½ cups eggplants … adjust your amounts of garlic, lemon juice, salt and pepper proportionately. In the food processor, blend the purees with seasonings, then with the motor running, drizzle in olive oil (I used 14 tablespoons). Not too much oil and not too much processing–consistency should be nice and thick.
Refrigerate and let ripen at least 12 hours before serving.
*This ajvar is about 18 calories per tablespoonful…
