Kyopoolou
Or Bulgarian aubergine sauce
Ingredients:
3 medium eggplants
1 kg green peppers
2 cloves of garlic
Sunflower oil or olive oil
½ teaspoon salt
1-2 tablespoons white balsamic vinegar
Fresh parsley
Preparation:
Wash the eggplants and remove the green part around the stalk. But keep the latter. Place the eggplants on a baking dish, covered with parchment paper. Bake at 200°C until the flesh softens, even around the stalk. Then roast the peppers under the grill function of the oven.
Peel the roasted vegetables and seed the peppers. Put everything in a large bowl. Then add the spices, such as salt, pressed garlic, parsley, oil and vinegar (quantity to taste). At this point, you can either blitz them until smooth puree, or chop with a manual meat grinder, or mash them with a manual potato masher. I prefer roughly mashed.
Serve as an appetizer with a nice salad (such as the Shepherd’s salad or Shopska salad) and favorite bread.
Jarred for the winter:
If you make large quantities of kyopoolou in the fall, this tapenade can be sealed in jars. To do this, first boil the jars and lids in boiling water for 5 minutes. Separately, cook the kyopoolou for 10 minutes, seasoned just with salt, oil and parsley. Then fill the jars up to the neck with hot kyopoolou. Seal tightly.
Sterilization:
Place all the jars in a deep saucepan, the bottom of which is lined with a cloth. Fill the pan with cold water until it covers the jars by 1 cm and boil for 10 minutes from the boiling point. Take the jars out of the pan and leave them upside down until they cool completely. When serving, season the kyopoolou with freshly pressed garlic, parsley and vinegar. Sprinkle with more salt and oil, if necessary.