Roast Tomato Salad
This summery roast tomato salad is incredibly delicious. It’s sweet, tart and wonderfully fresh. It’s perfect for a quick outdoor lunch.
This salad works so great because of the roasted cherry tomatoes. Baking the tomatoes breaks down the fruit and they begin to ooze out copious amounts of sweet tomato juice. This creates a naturally delicious dressing.
The sweet roast tomato juices combined with capers, balsamic vinegar and maple syrup is simply delightful. This tart and fragrant sauce is the perfect counterpoint to chewy bulgur wheat and the fresh wild rocket.
How to make roast tomato salad
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Recipe video
Guided Steps
Preheat your oven to 200c/390f (fan oven).
Pour the 500g of cherry tomatoes onto a baking tray and combine with the 5g of chopped thyme, 1 teaspoon of sea salt, 2 diced garlic cloves and 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Toss the cherry tomatoes until evenly covered in the oil and aromatics.
Place the cherry tomatoes into the oven and roast for 15-18 minutes until the skins start to blacken an blister. As the tomatoes cook they’ll release much of their juices into the tray. You want enough of this juice to remain after roasting as it will flavour the bulgur.
Whilst your tomatoes are roasting, cook the 150g of bulgur wheat to packet instructions, making sure to season the cooking water with a pinch of sea salt.
Mix together the 1 tablespoon of maple syrup, 1 tablespoon of balsamic vinegar and 1 1/2 tablespoons of capers in a small pouring jug.
Once the tomatoes have finished roasting toss with the cooked bulgur and caper dressing until evenly mixed. Arrange the 25g of wild rocket leaves on top of the salad.
This salad can be served immediately, warm, or after cooled.
Serving Suggestions
This salad works wonderfully on it’s own or as part of a larger meal. I love to use it as part of a veggie barbeque. It’s the perfect base salad for grilled courgettes and vegetable skewers. Double up or triple up the portion amounts and serve it in a big sharing platter to go alongside your veggie gril.
I’m also a fan of using this as a small starter for a summery dinner party. The portion sizes are enough to serve 4 small starter plates. It’s a complimentary starter for a Mediterranean style main. Think pastas, meze or rice.
Seasonal Swapouts
Tomato season in the UK and much of western Europe spans from mid summer to the beginning of autumn. Outside of these months you can substitute the tomato for cubed winter squash. Chop the squash into 1cm pieces and toss in the same mixture of garlic and thyme. Then roast for 25 minutes until soft.
You can replace the wild rocket for other seasonal greens like baby spinach or kales.
Roast Tomato Salad
This meal is around 86% less polluting than the average UK meal.
Eating this recipe will save around 2.52 KG CO2e per person.
That’s equivalent to the emissions produced driving 20.87 KM in a modern car.
How do I calculate this?Ingredients
- 500 g Cherry Tomatoes
- 2 Tablespoons Extra Virgin Olive Oil
- 2 Large Cloves Garlic (finely chopped)
- 5 g Fresh Thyme (de-stemmed and finely chopped)
- 1 Teaspoon Sea Salt
- 25 g Wild Rocket
- 1 1/2 Tablespoons Capers
- 1 Tablespoon Maple Syrup
- 1 Tablespoon Balsamic Vinegar
- 150 g Bulgur Wheat
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 200c/390f (fan oven).
- Pour the 500g of cherry tomatoes onto a baking tray and combine with the 5g of chopped thyme, 1 teaspoon of sea salt, 2 diced garlic cloves and 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Toss the cherry tomatoes until evenly covered in the oil and aromatics.
- Place the cherry tomatoes into the oven and roast for 15-18 minutes until the skins start to blacken an blister. As the tomatoes cook they'll release much of their juices into the tray. You want enough of this juice to remain after roasting as it will flavour the bulgur.
- Whilst your tomatoes are roasting, cook the 150g of bulgur wheat to packet instructions, making sure to season the cooking water with a pinch of sea salt.
- Mix together the 1 tablespoon of maple syrup, 1 tablespoon of balsamic vinegar and 1 1/2 tablespoons of capers in a small pouring jug.
- Once the tomatoes have finished roasting toss with the cooked bulgur and caper dressing until evenly mixed. Arrange the 25g of wild rocket leaves on top of the salad.
- This salad can be served immediately, warm, or after cooled.