Rocket, roasted tomato, basil and feta salad

This salad is seriously amazing for two main reasons firstly its tastes great and secondly as it uses plenty of rocket (arugula for our American friends), the reason why I like this is because we have a forest of of rocket growing in the vegetable garden. I enjoy rocket salads as our homegrown wild rocket has a spicy Parmesan cheese edge to its flavour so its great in combination with other Mediterranean salad ingredients. This salad is a mish mash of Italian and Greek flavours and screams languid hot summer days to me.

I am sure I can almost here Spanish guitars and feel Balearic breezes through the trees.....

I am sure if you didn't fancy roasting the tomatoes that some good sun dried tomatoes would be nearly as good in this dish, plus you could swap out the feta for local goat cheese, serve with chilled white wine and good bread, simple grilled meats or fish and good friends.

What you need

• Rocket (Arugula) - a good handful for each person
• Basil- a few sprigs - leaves picked off
• Feta or goats cheese - 1 block serves about 4 - chopped or crumbled
• 6 - 10 baby plum or cherry tomatoes - halved
• Extra virgin olive oil ( extra virgin rapeseed would also be good)
• Sprig of fresh thyme - leaves picked off
• White wine vinegar / balsamic vinegar / red wine vinegar
• Pinch of sugar
• Salt and freshly ground pepper

What you do 

• Heat your oven to 220c
• Toss the tomatoes in a little of the olive oil and place in a small oven tray, sprinkle with the thyme and a little sugar and season with salt and pepper.
• Roast for about 30 minutes or so until the tomatoes are slightly charred and soft (like in the bottom image)
• Cool ( you can store in the fridge for a while if you like, no snaffling !)
• iMake a dressing of the pan juices, a good slug of olive oil and some vinegar (you are going for 6/1 oil to vinegar ratio), taste and adjust seasoning if needed.
• To assemble the salad, toss the rocket in the dressing , then top with the cheese and roasted tomatoes and drizzle with a little more of the dressing.
• Strew with basil leaves
• Serve immediately and devour greedily.

I'm linking up to Simple and in Season, created by Ren Behan and hosted this month by Elizabeth's Kitchen Diary.

                                            

I am also linking to Extra Veg created by Fuss Free Flavours and Utterly Scrummy and hosted this month over at Maison Cupcake.