A round mound of zaalouk on a patterned plate — glossy brick-red cooked aubergine and tomato flecked with dark aubergine skin, topped with fresh coriander leaves

Beginner

Zaalouk (Aubergine & Tomato Salad)

Name: Zaalouk (Aubergine & Tomato Salad)
Total time: 50 min
Yield: 4
Cuisine: Moroccan
Ingredients: 500 g Aubergines (eggplants); 400 g Ripe tomatoes; 4 Garlic cloves; 60 ml Olive oil; 1 1/2 tsp Sweet paprika; 1 tsp Ground cumin; 20 g Fresh coriander, chopped; 10 g Flat-leaf parsley, chopped; 1 tbsp Lemon juice; 1/4 tsp Cayenne or harissa; 1 tsp Salt

A cooked Moroccan salad that eats like a dip: grilled aubergine crushed into tomatoes with garlic, paprika and cumin, then cooked down until the oil comes back to the surface.

Source

Recipe by Moroccan home kitchens · 🏺 Traditional · Moroccan household cooking

Moroccan home cooking — A Moroccan salad of cooked aubergine and tomatoes: the aubergine is grilled, then combined with the tomatoes and seasoned with spices and garlic. It belongs to the family of cooked Moroccan salads served in small dishes at the start of a meal, and has no single author — the paprika-and-cumin seasoning and the smashing rather than blending are the constants across households.

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⏱ 50 min🍽 4 servings🔥 150 kcal🇲🇦 Morocco🌶️

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Steps

Char the aubergines whole over a gas flame or under a hot grill, turning, 15–20 minutes, until blackened and collapsing.
💡 Prick them first so they do not burst. You can also peel and cube them raw and cook them straight in the pan — quicker, and common in Moroccan homes — but you lose the smoke.
Let them cool slightly, then peel off the skin and roughly chop the flesh.
Grate the tomatoes on the coarse side of a box grater, holding the skin — you will be left with skin in your hand and purée in the bowl.
💡 This is the North African way to skin a tomato and it takes 30 seconds — no boiling, no ice bath.
Warm the olive oil in a wide pan over medium heat and add the garlic. Cook 30 seconds, just until it smells sweet.
Add the paprika and cumin and stir for 20 seconds.
💡 Twenty seconds, no more. Paprika burns faster than almost any spice and turns bitter and grey — have the tomatoes ready in your hand before the spices go in.
Pour in the grated tomato and add the salt. It will hiss and stop the spices cooking.
Simmer 10 minutes over medium heat, until the tomato darkens and reduces by about a third.
Add the chopped aubergine and stir it through.
Cook 15 minutes more, mashing with a wooden spoon or fork as you go, until the aubergine breaks down into the tomato.
💡 Mash it, do not blend it. Zaalouk is a salad, not a purée — you should still be able to see and feel the aubergine. A blender turns it into baba ganoush's less interesting cousin.
Keep cooking until the water has gone and the olive oil separates and glistens at the edges of the pan.
💡 That returning oil is the doneness signal across North African cooking. Stop before it and zaalouk tastes watery and raw; the flavour concentrates in the last five minutes.
Stir in the coriander, parsley, lemon juice and cayenne if using.
Taste and adjust the salt and lemon, then let it cool to room temperature.
💡 Zaalouk is served warm or at room temperature, never hot, and it is noticeably better an hour later once the flavours settle.
Serve with crusty bread or khobz, as part of a spread of small salads.

💡 Tips

Beginner's mistake: stopping while it is still wet. Zaalouk should be thick enough to hold its shape on bread, not slide off. If liquid pools around the edge of the pan, keep going — the oil separating out is your signal.
Winter tomatoes will not reduce to anything sweet. Use a 400 g tin of good chopped tomatoes instead of pale fresh ones — this is one dish where tinned genuinely beats out-of-season fresh.
Zaalouk and taktouka are cousins and are almost always served together — one aubergine, one pepper. Making both at once costs one extra pan and doubles the table.
It keeps 4 days in the fridge and improves for the first two. Bring it back to room temperature before serving — straight from the fridge, the olive oil is solid and the flavour is muted.