After watching so many people make the viral baked feta and tomato dish that Liemessa started making, I knew that this was one food trend I wanted to get involved in. I mean I love pasta so why not?! But it’s summer and I also love salad, and I’ve been weirdly craving lentils. So this happened instead. All the flavours of that pasta but in a lentil salad. It’s so good. I still love the pasta version too though!

This salad is a delight warm and still do delicious cold. This means it’s the perfect recipe to double (this one serves 2) and prep for work lunches, whether work is something that’s happening at home or actually back in the office.

I used Danish feta here, I prefer it’s creaminess in something like this, but the original feta pasta recipe uses greek so you do you. The extra virgin olive oil is important as it’s the building block of the dressing, so don’t skimp. It also helps everything get caramelised. Be patient while baking the tomatoes and feta, you want the tomatoes to be blistered and the feta to be soft and golden.

I don’t add extra salt as I cook the lentils in stock and find this mixed with the salty feta is perfect for me. But you do you! Scroll down for a quick little video!

Serves 2

Ingredients

1/2 cup puy lentils

1 cup vegetable stock

100g Danish feta

250g cherry tomatoes (or similar I used a rainbow mix)

2 garlic cloves

2 Tbs extra virgin olive oil

1/4 tsp pepper

1/4 tsp chilli flakes

1/2 tsp roughly chopped rosemary

1/2 lemon

1/2 cup roughly chopped parsley

2 Tbs finely chopped chives

1 Lebanese cucumber, cut in half length wise then cut into 3-5mm thick slices.

Directions

Preheat oven to 200 C.

Rinse lentils and place in a small pot with the vegetable stock, and a cup of water. Cook for 20 minutes or until just tender. Drain and set aside.

Meanwhile, Place the tomatoes in a baking dish, slice any larger ones in half so they’re the same size. Drizzle in half the oil and toss. Make a space for the feta and place it in the middle of the baking dish. Sprinkle pepper, chilli, and rosemary over top then drizzle with the remaining oil. Add garlic. Cook for 20-30 minutes in the middle of the oven, the tomatoes should be blistered and sizzling. Then turn the oven to the grill setting and grill for 5-10 minutes until the feta has some colour.

Remove.

Pile the lentils into a bowl, Swueeze over the juice of half a lemon, and the herbs and spoon out the tomatoes. Mash the garlic cloves into the oil and then spoon this over the lentils. Toss to combine. Spoon over the melty feta and add the cucumber. Toss gently and serve.

HH. xx