Salad Clementine

There's no fruit in this: it's named after a posh French bird, not an orangey thing!

This is the kind of thing you cook in your dreams when Elizabeth David comes round to tea. You offer this with perhaps a glass of lightly chilled Pouilly Fuissé and she smiles at you because she likes it...

Ingredients

• 6 medium tomatoes
• 6 hard boiled eggs
• 1 tablespoon capers
• 1 tablespoon sliced gherkin
• 1 tin anchovy fillets
• A little milk

Dressing

• 2 tablespoons red vinegar
• 1 teaspoon mustard powder
• 6 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 tablespoons tomato puree
• 1 tablespoon fines herbs
• Salt and pepper

Cut a shallow line across the tops of the tomatoes with the point of a knife, just to break the skin, no more. Boil a kettle of water, and pour over the tomatoes. Leave for no more than 30 seconds, and drain them. This allows the skins to be peeled easily from the tomatoes. Peel them, then cut them in half through the stalk. Remove the seeds. Heat the oil in a frying pan, and sauté the tomatoes quickly on both sides. Lift them out of the pan carefully, and leave to cool. Drain the anchovies, split each fillet into two and then slice each halved fillet to make matchsticks. Place to soak in a dish of milk, to draw out the salt.

Peel the hard boiled eggs, and cut each into four vertical slices. Two of these should be white only, while two should contain the hard yolk. Reserve the slices with the yolk and chop up the remaining whites. Combine the dressing ingredients in a jug, and mix well.

Lay the slices of egg on a serving plate, and place a slice of tomato on top of each, face down. Place the slices of anchovy over the tomatoes so that they form a lattice. Pour over the dressing, and place in the fridge for an hour to chill. Just before serving, sprinkle with the chopped egg whites.