Recipe for Middle Eastern Tomato Salad (Salad Shirazi)

I vowed that I wouldn't repeat vegetables for WHB, but that doesn't include things that are growing in my garden! This week I'm writing about parsley, more specifically Italian parsley or flat leaf parsley. I know the flat leafed parsley is highly prized for cooking, but to tell the truth I like the curly type too, and I have both in my garden. Parsley contains vitamins A and C, and is used in nearly every cuisine on earth. In the garden parsley is fairly easy to grow, but seeds should be soaked overnight for quicker sprouting. Parsley is a biennial plant, but if you're not too faithful about clearing it out at the end of the year, like me, enough seeds will drop that it will grow in the same spot year after year.

I used my parsley to make Middle Eastern Tomato Salad, from my recipe archives, and another one of those recipes no one saw last summer and which was in need of a picture. I learned to make this dish from my friend Massoud who came to the United States from Iran. If you order this in a middle eastern restaurant it might be called Salad Shirazi, and most likely in the U.S. you will get a version with much less mint and parsley than in the batch I made. Massoud taught me to make it the true middle eastern way, with nearly equal amounts of cucumber, tomato, onion, mint, and parsley.

Middle Eastern Tomato Salad

(4-6 servings, Massoud's recipe)

Ingredients:

All amounts are approximate. Feel free to use more or less of some ingredients, depending on your own preferences.

1 cup finely diced cucumber (remove seeds if they are large)
1 cup finely diced tomato
1 cup finely diced onion (I used sweet Vidalia onion)
1 cup finely chopped parsley (or a little less, to taste)
1 cup finely chopped mint (or a little less, to taste)
2-3 T olive oil, or more to taste
1-2 T fresh lemon juice, or more to taste
salt, pepper to taste


Instructions:

Chop cucumber in pieces less than 1/2 inch and put in colander. Add a generous amount of salt and let sit while you chop other ingredients. (If the tomatoes are juicy I add them to the cucumbers and let the juice run out.) Cucumbers, tomatoes, and onions should be cut in same-size pieces, and parsley and mint should be chopped very finely. (You can use a food processor to chop the mint and parsley if you wish.) When all ingredients are chopped, combine in mixing bowl. Mix in olive oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper. (Start with a bit less and add more until it tastes right to you. I find it does not need a great deal of dressing to taste good.) Serve immediately.

This will keep for only about one day in the refrigerator. By the second day it is getting quite mushy, and you may need to drain off some liquid and add more dressing.

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South Beach Suggestions:
This salad is a perfect side dish for any phase of the South Beach Diet, or any other diet for that matter, and it's an incredible tasting summer treat for anyone, whether or not you're on a diet. I think it pairs wonderfully with any kind of grilled meat or fish, and in the summer when I have lots of tomatoes, cucumbers, mint, and parsley in my garden, this is something I'll be making often.