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summer tomato and horseradish salad

starter | serves 6
For this salad it’s great to try and get a whole mixture of different tomatoes, at room temperature, nice and ripe. Let them sunbathe on the window ledge if need be! Try and get hold of fresh horseradish – give your greengrocer a challenge to get some in.

Cut the bigger tomatoes into slices about 1cm/½ inch thick. You can halve the cherry tomatoes or leave them whole. Then sprinkle them all with a good dusting of sea salt. Put them in a colander and leave them for 30 minutes. What's going to happen here is that the salt will draw the excess moisture out of the tomatoes, intensifying their flavour. Don't worry about the salad being too salty, as a lot of the salt drips away.

Place the tomatoes in a large bowl and dress with enough extra virgin olive oil to loosen (approximately 6 tablespoons), and 1–2 tablespoons of vinegar, but do add these to your own taste. Toss around and check for seasoning – you may or may not need salt but will certainly need pepper. Add the garlic. Now start to add the horseradish. Stir in a couple of teaspoons to begin with, toss around and taste. If you like it a bit hotter, add a bit more horseradish. All I do now is get some finely sliced flat-leaf parsley (stalks and leaves) and mix this into the tomatoes. Toss everything together and serve as a wonderful salad, making sure you mop up all the juices with some nice squashy bread.

This salad is fantastic with roast beef, goat's cheese or jacket potatoes. And to be honest, even if you put these tomatoes in a roasting tray and roasted them with some sausages scattered around them it would be nice.


• from Jamie's Dinners