Deconstructed Pizza Salad

The contents of a pizza (sort of) in a fancy-looking dinner party starter that really does taste as good as it looks – and has an appealingly pretentious name, too!

Fat Expat Chris ‘Slimseum’ Viljoen’s comment on the gazpacho salad I posted up a couple of weeks ago set me to thinking about the concept of deconstruction (you know, the almost ritualistic fight between life and death in the reduction of an organic entity to highlight and celebrate each of its component selfnesses in the de-meshing of the quintessential life linkages of the whole’s fabric) and that led to pizza.

So here it is. A salad inspired by pizza.

Ingredients

• 1 red pepper
• 1 yellow pepper
• 4 thin slices prosciutto or parma ham
• 25g parmesan, shaved
• 12 olives, pitted
• 12 slices ciabatta
• Buffalo Mozzarella
• 8 cherry tomatoes on their stalks
• 4 tbsp olive oil
• ½ tsp dried thyme
• 12-16 leaves fresh basil
• 8 sprigs fresh marjoram or oregano

Grill the peppers, turning them every 4-5 minutes so that their skins brown and blister on all sides, then either place them in a pan with the lid on or in a secured plastic bag for ten minutes. Remove them and, under a cold running tap, remove the skins, the stalk and the seeds. Pat the peppers dry, then slice them into 8 pieces, following the natural line of the segments. Lay these in a container and drizzle with three tablespoons of the olive oil and thyme. Incidentally, these can be left in the ‘fridge for a couple of days to marinate and are great on crisp slices of bread toasted with a light brush of olive oil.

Brush the ciabatta slices lightly with oil and place in an oven at around GM4 to toast for 10 minutes or so, or until they start to brown and become crisp.

Pan fry the tomatoes in the rest of the oil, adding a good pinch of pepper and salt – this will only take a minute and you need to take care that you don’t overdo it or the skins will split and they’ll mush up.

Lay the peppers on a plate, with a twist of ham across them. Dot the plate with broken off chunks of mozzarella, the herbs, tomatoes and olives. Drizzle a spoon of oil over the whole lot, sprinkle with parmesan and serve with the toasted ciabatta slices on the side.