Harissa Roasted Tomatoes

These harissa roasted tomatoes are sweet, spicy, soft and juicy – serve with cous cous or wild rice. Get the recipe below.

Turn up the heat

I love autumn. I don’t know if it’s the cooling temperatures or the turning of the leaves but I always get excited when autumn comes around. While some people complain about the chill in the air, I think it’s the perfect opportunity to get in the kitchen and start cooking warming dishes. From pumpkin soup to cheesey vegetable pie: I like to cook the kind of dishes that not only fill your belly but warm you up too. Of course a great way of doing that is to add a little spice to whatever it is you cook!

Rather than sharing another curry recipe, this time I looked to North Africa for some inspiration. Harissa is one of my favourite spice pastes. Made from hot peppers, garlic and spices such as caraway seeds, coriander seeds and cumin. Depending on where you get it from, it might also include paprika, tomato and even rose. It’s a heady mix that brings wonderful heat and fragrance to whatever you cook with it.

If I’m looking for a really quick and easy dinner I will often raid my fridge for whatever vegetables I can find, smother them in harissa and cook them low and slow. But, my favourite combination is thinly sliced white onion, a mix of heritage tomatoes and big hunks of sweet red peppers. I fill a roasting tin with them, making sure they’ve all got enough space around them, spoon over generous helpings of harissa paste, loosened up with a little oil. Then roast. When the cooking time is up, the tomato juices will have bled into the pan helping to soften the onions and peppers. I add a few chickpeas in the last 10 minutes of cooking then, once it’s done, I sprinkle over fresh coriander leaves.

The recipe

My favourite way to serve this dish is over wild rice, but cous cous works just as well as the grain soak up all of the spicy tomato juices.

5 from 10 votes

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Harissa Roasted Tomatoes

These harissa roasted tomatoes are sweet, spicy, soft and juicy - serve with cous cous or wild rice.

Course Dinner

Keyword chickpeas, coriander, harissa, red pepper, tomatoes, white onion

Prep Time 5 minutes

Cook Time 35 minutes

Total Time 40 minutes

Author Emma Walton

Ingredients

• 1 white onion
• 1 large red pepper
• 500 grams tomatoes varying sizes and varieties
• 6 tbsp harissa paste
• 3 tbsp olive oil
• 1 tin chickpeas drained
• salt
• pepper
• 1 handful coriander leaves only

Instructions

1. Pre-heat your oven to 200C/400F/Gas mark 6.

2. Thinly slice the white onion and place in the bottom of your roasting tin.

3. Next, de-seed the pepper and cut into large pieces (roughly 1.5 inches in size) then place in the roasting tin on top of the sliced onion.

4. Cut the tomatoes into halves and quarters - it's nice to leave them different sizes as they will then break down at different rates - and add to the roasting tin along with the other vegetables.

5. Mix together the olive oil and harissa then spoon over the tomatoes.

6. Place the roasting tin into the oven and cook for 25 minutes.

7. Add the chickpeas to the roasting tin and give the vegetables a good mix - they should have softened nicely and the tomato juices should be bubbling in the bottom of the tin.

8. Season well with salt and pepper.

9. Place back in the oven and cook for another 10 minutes or until the vegetables are roasted and the chickpeas are hot.

10. Leave to cool slightly before sprinkling with coriander leaves and serving over rice or cous cous.