Market Salad with Roasted Eggplant and Mint
This vibrant Market Salad with Roasted Eggplant and Mint is a fresh, flavor-packed dish inspired by classic Levantine ingredients. Crisp cucumbers, juicy tomatoes, radishes, and peppers are tossed with a bright lemon-sumac dressing, then paired with tender, caramelized eggplant and fresh mint. It’s the perfect balance of crunchy, creamy, zesty, and herbaceous—ideal as a side dish or a light, satisfying main.
Ingredients
- 1 globe eggplant cut into 1½ inch cubes
- 4 tbsp olive oil divided
- salt
- 4 Persian cucumbers cut into asymmetrical pieces about 1 inch thick
- 2 heirloom tomatoes cut into 1 inch pieces
- 3 sweet mini peppers or half a bell pepper, cut into thin slices
- 3-5 watermelon radishes thinly sliced and soaked in ice water
- 2 scallions thinly sliced
- 5 stems mint leaves removed from the stems and torn by hand
- 1 lemon juiced
- ½ tsp sumac
Instructions
- Toss cubed eggplant with salt and set in a colander over a bowl for about an hour. The eggplants will release their excess water and sweeten this way. Preheat the oven to 400°. Discard the liquid that comes out of the eggplants, toss them with 1 tbsp of olive oil and roast in the oven for about 30 minutes, mixing them around with a spatula once to cook evenly.
- While the eggplants cool, chop and prepare the remained of your ingredients. In a bowl, placed chopped Persian cucumbers, tomatoes, mini peppers, drained radishes, scallions and mint. Add in cooled eggplant cubes.
- Season the salad with salt, pepper, sumac, the juice of one lemon and the remaining 3 tbsp of olive oil. Toss and serve immediately.