Bulgarian Salad: Shopska Salata

Bulgaria is a country in the Balkans bordering on the Black Sea in southeastern Europe. The country traces its history back to the Bulgars, one of the Turkic groups from Asia who eventually migrated into Europe. The Bulgars settled in a part of the Balkans and they mixed with the inhabitants there, many of whom were Slavic. This led to the Turkic language of the Bulgars being overtaken and replaced by the Slavic based language of the region that came to be called Bulgarian, which is written in Cyrillic, as are Serbian, Russian and Ukrainian, for instance.*

 

This salad is one of the national dishes of Bulgaria, with its main components providing the colors of the Bulgarian flag (white-green-red); however, the salad is also well known in Serbia and in Macedonia (North Macedonia), one of the former components of Yugoslavia.** Bulgarian sirene cheese is not easy to find, and you can substitute Bulgarian feta cheese, which might be a little easier to find, or just use Greek feta cheese, which is easy to find, although Bulgarian feta is more tart than its Greek cousin. NOTE: I get Bulgarian feta here in Cleveland at the "Culinary Specialties" shop at the West Side Market (it's not expensive).

 

Ingredients (4 to 5 servings):  

3 medium tomatoes, chopped

1 medium cucumber, peel on, split lengthwise and seeds scooped out, then chopped

1 green bell pepper, chopped

1 red bell pepper, chopped

1 white or yellow onion 

1/4 cup chopped parsley

1/3 cup sunflower oil (or Greek olive oil)

2 tablespoons red wine vinegar

1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup Bulgarian sirene cheese (substitute Bulgarian or Greek feta cheese), crumbled

(optional) some large green olives for garnish  

 

Add the tomatoes, cucumber, green and red bell peppers, onion and parsley to a bowl. In a separate bowl, mix together well the oil, red wine vinegar, ground black pepper and salt. Refrigerate the vegetables and dressing mixture for a minimum of 2 hours, then mix the dressing well again and add it to the salad, tossing the vegetables to coat with the dressing. Top each serving with some crumbled cheese.  Optionally add some large green olives around the edge of each serving or on top.

 

* "Cyrillic" is a writing system developed back in about the 900s (A.D.) and it is named in honor of the Eastern Orthodox saint, Cyril.

 

** Macedonia is a region in the Balkans that has been contested by Greece, Bulgaria, Serbia and (the former) Yugoslavia. The terminology "Macedonia" itself is controversial, as across the border lies the Greek region of Macedonia. When Yugoslavia dissolved in the early 1990s, its former component state of "Macedonia" became an independent country. In early 2019 the "official" name was changed to "(Republic of) North Macedonia," although many citizens there do not agree with the renaming. 

 

  

WORD HISTORY:

Desk-This word is related to "disk/disc" and to "dish," words tracing back to Greek, then borrowed by Latin and then borrowed by English, to "dais," a word borrowed from French, which had it from Latin, which had it from Greek. The ultimate origin of "desk" is unknown, but it goes back to transliterated Ancient Greek "diskos," meaning "a round, flat plate or stone." This was borrowed by Latin as "discus," meaning "dish, platter," and in Italian this devloped as "desco," meaning, "plate, platter," but also "table for eating," and "writing table for an official." Latin "seemingly" took the Italian form as "desca," with the "writing table" idea prevailing as the primary meaning by circa 1300, and English borrowed the word in the mid 1300s with that same meaning. The idea of a desk being used by officials or authorities in some capacity brought about usage in that sense, even though a physical desk was not necessarily involved, as in, weather or sports segments of news on radio or television, "Now for tonight's weather, here's Jim from the weather desk." A "desk job" came into use (late 1800s?) to contrast a clerical or official position with a job of manual labor.