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Choban Salata (Azerbaijani Shepherd's Salad)
Serves 4 Prep 15 min Cook 0 min Total 15 min Type Side Origin Azerbaijan

Choban Salata (Azerbaijani Shepherd's Salad)

Azerbaijan's shepherd's salad: tomato, cucumber and red onion diced fine, tossed with dill, mint and tarragon, dressed with olive oil and lemon.

Serves 4 Prep 15 minutes Cook 0 minutes Units Rate

Overview

The Azerbaijani version of the shepherd's salad that turns up in some form on every table from the Balkans to Persia, the bright herby counter to anything rich coming out of the kitchen. You dice tomatoes, cucumber and red onion to five-millimetre cubes (smaller than a typical chopped salad, almost a relish) and chop the herbs fine: dill, mint and tarragon, the tarragon being the move that distinguishes the Azeri version from its neighbours. Everything tosses together with olive oil, lemon juice and salt about fifteen minutes before serving, so the salt draws the tomato juice out and the salad relaxes into itself. Best the same day; the salad weeps if held overnight. Eat with grilled meat, with plov, with lavash, with whatever the main is.

Ingredients

  • 4 ripe medium tomatoes (about 500 g, ideally a mix of red and yellow)
  • 2 short cucumbers (about 300 g, ridge cucumbers or Lebanese)
  • 1 red onion (small, about 80 g)
  • 15 g fresh dill (leaves and tender stems)
  • 15 g fresh mint (leaves only)
  • 5 g fresh tarragon (leaves only)
  • 4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
  • 2 tablespoons lemon juice
  • ¾ teaspoon salt
  • ½ teaspoon ground black pepper
  • ½ teaspoon ground sumac (optional, for tartness)

Method

Stage 1 - Dice

  1. Core the tomatoes and dice to 5 mm cubes.
  2. Peel the cucumbers if the skin is tough (Lebanese cucumbers can keep their skin); halve lengthways, scoop the seeds with a teaspoon, dice to 5 mm.
  3. Peel and dice the red onion to 3 mm.
  4. Chop the dill, mint and tarragon fine.

Stage 2 - Dress

  1. In a wide bowl, combine the tomato, cucumber, onion and herbs.
  2. Drizzle the olive oil; squeeze the lemon juice over.
  3. Sprinkle salt, pepper and sumac.
  4. Toss gently with a wooden spoon.
  5. Rest 15 minutes (salt draws the tomato juice and softens the onion).

Stage 3 - Serve

  1. Toss once more.
  2. Spoon into a shallow bowl; pour any plate juices back over.

Notes

  • Salt 15 minutes ahead, not earlier: longer and the cucumbers go limp and the salad swims in water.
  • Skin-on cucumber for crunch: ridge cucumbers stay crisp longer than the long English variety.
  • The herb trinity is non-negotiable: dill + mint + tarragon is what makes this Azeri rather than generic. Skip the tarragon and it's a Turkish salata.

Storage

  • Best within 1 hour of dressing.
  • The undressed vegetables and herbs hold 4 hours refrigerated; dress at the last minute.

Recipes mentioned here

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Plov

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Azerbaijan's wedding rice, the centrepiece of any celebration worth the name, and a dish that takes most of a day to do properly. You soak basmati for an hour in salted water, drain it, par-boil for five minutes in heavily salted water, drain again. A wide heavy pot is buttered, and a sheet of lavash (or a saffron-soaked rice base) lines the bottom to form the qazmaq crust that's the prize at the end of the meal. The par-boiled rice piles on top, butter melts down through it, the pot covers and steams for forty minutes to an hour on low heat. Meanwhile you cook the qara separately: lamb shoulder cubes browned, onions softened slowly, dried apricots and chestnuts added with a splash of water, the whole stew simmering for ninety minutes until the lamb is meltingly tender. The plov comes to the table with the rice mounded on a platter, the qazmaq crust broken and shared at the table, and the qara spooned alongside. A meal that announces itself.

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Lavash

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The paper-thin flatbread of the Caucasus, on UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritage list since 2014, and the bread that wraps every grilled meat from Yerevan to Baku. You make a dough from just three things (flour, water and salt) that is firmer than a pasta dough and smoother than a bread dough. Thirty minutes' rest under a damp cloth lets the gluten relax enough to roll. The dough divides into eight balls, each rolled paper-thin (you should be able to read newsprint through the sheet before it goes in the pan). Onto a heavy dry skillet over high heat for sixty to ninety seconds per side, just long enough to puff and blister. Stack the cooked sheets under a clean tea towel as you go so they stay pliable. Eaten the same day, torn around grilled meat, wrapped around kebabs, used as a plate, used as a napkin.

Sides 1 hour 27 minutes Serves8

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