Paprika Pepperoni Dip

Ingredients for 1 servings:

• 250 g Pepper, green, long, medium hot
• 200 g tomato paste
• 5 large tomatoes
• 1 bunch of parsley, large, approx. 150 mm diameter
• 1 bunch of mint, large, approx. 150 mm diameter
• 6 cloves garlic
• 200 ml olive oil, possibly more
• 4 m.-sized onion(s)
• 700 g sweet paprika paste (Tatli Biber)
• 700 g paprika paste (Aci Biber), hot
• 2 tbsp salt

Instructions

Working time approx. 40 minutes; Rest time approx. 1 hour; Total time approx. 1 hour 40 minutes

Ezme – spicy paste in Turkish style

All ingredients are available at a Turkish grocery store. The quantity sounds enormous, but it’s based on the large jars of paprika paste, which each contain 700 g. Peel or clean the peppers, tomatoes, parsley, mint, garlic, and onions, and roughly chop them so they fit in an electric chopper. Chop the ingredients one by one briefly until they are still somewhat recognizable. Do not grind them into a homogenous paste. Pour everything into a large bowl, mix with the remaining ingredients, and let stand for an hour, stirring occasionally. If the paste seems too “dry,” add olive oil until the desired consistency is reached. This may be several hundred milliliters. It’s best to pour the finished paste into jars. You’ll probably never get the red color out of plastic containers. The two 700 g jars of sweet and hot paprika paste would be a start, but you’d need about the volume of 3000 ml. I can’t say anything about the shelf life, but one year unrefrigerated was no problem.