My uncle Nick ("just call me Delia... or is it Jamie? no, it's Nigel") made this for a family gathering at Christmas, and he's kindly agreed to let me publish the recipe here. Serves eight hungry Sampsons.
For the tabbouleh
- 200g dry bulgar wheat
- 330ml hot vegetable stock (Nick suggests Marigold brand)
- A handful of mint leaves
- A handful of flat-leafed parsley
Put the bulgar wheat in a bowl and pour over the vegetable stock. Leave for 45 minutes. (If some of the stock hasn't been absorbed at this point, stir in a bit more dry bulgar wheat and leave it a little longer.) Chop the mint leaves and parsley finely and stir into the soaked bulgar wheat.
Roasted peppers and tomatoes
- Red peppers
- Garlic, chopped
- Basil leaves, torn
- Fresh tomatoes, quartered
- Salt and pepper
- Olive oil
Halve some red peppers and put them in a roasting dish. Put a little bit of chopped garlic and a torn basil leaf into each. Then fill them up with quartered fresh tomatoes (three or four chunks each). Sprinkle the whole dish with salt and ground pepper, and drizzle olive oil into each pepper and a bit more into the roasting dish ("it helps to drink a few glasses of wine to perfect this sort of sloppy dribbling").
Cover the dish tightly with foil and put into a hottish oven (180-190°C) for 45 minutes. Uncover and cook for another 15 minutes. This produces lots of juice that'll go well with the tabbouleh.
Roasted onions, aubergines and celeriac
- A few small onions, peeled
- An aubergine
- Half a celeriac
- Fresh tomatoes, chopped
- Garlic, chopped
- Basil leaves, torn
- Salt and pepper
- A handful of cherry tomatoes
- Olive oil
In a roasting dish, but a few small peeled onions, an aubergine chopped into chunks, and about half a celeriac peeled and cut into chunks. Add some chopped fresh tomatoes, chopped garlic, torn basil leaves, salt, pepper and a generous dribbling of olive oil.
Cover with foil and bake in the same hottish oven for 45 minutes. Uncover, add a handful of cherry tomatoes, and cook for a further 15 minutes. If you've got a really big roasting dish, you can do this in the same dish as the peppers.
Roasted squash
- A butternut squash
- Olive oil
- 1tsp cumin seeds
- 1tsp coriander seeds
- 1tsp fennel seeds
- ½tsp crushed chilli flakes
- 1dsp soft brown sugar
- Salt
Chop a butternut squash into largish chunks and put them in a bowl with a little olive oil. In a pestle and mortar, grind together a teaspoon of cumin seeds, a teaspoon of coriander seeds, a teaspoon of fennel seeds, and half a teaspoon of crushed chilli flaskes. Add a dessert spoon of soft brown sugar. Add this mixture to the bowl and toss the chunks of squash around until coated. Put some oil onto a baking tray, tip the chunks onto the tray, and give them a generous sprinkling of salt. Bake in the hottish oven (again) for about 25 minutes, or until the squash is soft.
Finishing up
- Pine nuts, toasted
- Basil leaves, torn
Put the tabbouleh in a big bowl and arrange the roasted vegetables on top. Sprinkle with toasted pine nuts and a few torn-up basil leaves, and serve.