Big Itzik

The idea behind this dish is simple but winning – burn and chop a whole bunch of vegetables, add some herbs and seasoning, then mix just enough to leave it somewhere between a salad and a dip. I think this particular version is Turkish, as we’ve had similar things in Istanbul, but we first had it in a kebab shop run by a huge guy called Big Itzik. The shop was tucked behind a taxi rank in a smelly alley in Jaffa and so we always associate these flavours with the reek of cheap diesel fumes.