Caveman Roast Pepper Salad

Having watched a Steven Raichlen’s “Project Fire” show, where he cooked peppers and onions directly on coals of a wood fire for a salsa, I thought it would be fun to try it cooking vegetables directly on coals. I made a salad using Caveman cooked vegetables. I was very pleased with how the salad came out. The bell peppers were sweet and smoky and the onion came out sweet and soft. The lemon thyme gave it a pop of lemon flavor, mixed with thyme. I did not take any pictures.

Serves 4

Ingredients

• 4 ripe full size bell peppers (red, yellow, or orange peppers)
• 2 mid-sized yellow onion, unpeeled
• 2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
• 1 tablespoon of cider vinegar
• 1 teaspoon fresh lemon thyme leaves, chopped (See Notes if you don’t have lemon thyme)
• Salt and pepper to taste
• 2 to 4 sprigs of lemon thyme for garnish or 1 green scallion with the leaves cut on a diagonal

Tools:

Fire pit or someplace safe to have a wood fire, knife, cutting board, tongs, and bowl to serve

Instructions

1. Once your campfire has died down to glowing coals, put the bell peppers and unpeeled onions directly on the coals by carefully using tongs. Those coals are very hot! According to Themoblog by Thermoworks, the coals can be well over a 1000 degrees F!
2. With your tongs, turn the onions about every 5 minutes for about 30 to 40 minutes. The onions will turn completely black and look very burned. When ready, the onions will squeeze easily. (Use the tongs when checking to see if the onions will squeeze.) Remove from the coals and let cool enough that you can handle the onion without burning yourself.
3. With your tongs, turn the bell peppers when they blacken on the side against the coals. Turn until all sides are blackened, remove from the coals on to a plate and let rest until cool. The peppers cook a lot faster than the onions which is nice because letting the peppers cool will allow the skin to slip off easily.
4. Remove the blackened skin from from the bell peppers and peel off the blackened layer from the onion. This will also remove any ash from the bell peppers and onions.
5. Slice the root end from the onions. Cut them in half from root to stem. Cut each half of the onions into quarters from the root to stem
6. Stem and seed the bell peppers, then cut them into bite sized chunks
7. Put the cut onions and bell peppers in the bowl, toss with with salt, pepper, chopped thyme, oil, and vinegar.
8. Taste to see if more salt or pepper is needed.
9. If using thyme for a garnish, strip the leaves of the thyme sprigs and sprinkle on top of the salad. If using the scallion leaves for garnish, sprinkle the cut scallion leaves on top of the salad.

Notes:

Do not put the vegetables in the flames, as that will burn them and not cook them properly. You are looking for glowing coals. You can have a fire on the other other side of the campfire.

You can also use lump charcoal instead of a wood to create your coals.

If you don’t have lemon thyme, it is okay to use regular thyme. If using regular thyme, add about 1/2 teaspoon of grated lemon zest.

Using different colors of ripe bell peppers makes for a visual feast for the eyes.