Red pepper paste (Massa de pimentão)

THE capsicums, both fiery chilli and mild salad peppers, are important seasonings in European kitchens.

Many country housewives grow a small round variety of pepper for drying, and hang strings of the ox-blood red beads by the stove for use in winter seasonings and stews.

The Catalans prefer their own special variety, the ñora, and the gardeners of Hungary have an even wider choice.

Red pepper paste, massa de pimentão, is a speciality of Portugal. It is made with the large juicy red peppers which are normally eaten fresh (and which are very easily available in our shops).

In home territory, the peppers would be merely sprinkled with the salt and left to pickle for a few days in the warmth of the Mediterranean kitchen, before being pounded up in a mortar with the oil and garlic.

Portuguese cooks use the paste as a marinade for meat stir-fried Oriental-style, culinary habits picked up by the adventurous Portuguese sailors through their 16th- and 17th-century trading activities with the Far East.

(Makes approximately 1½ lb/ 750g) Start the day before

Preparation time: 20 minutes Cooking time: 1 hour

Ingredients:

n 2lb/ 1kg ripe red peppers

n ¼ pint/ 150ml olive oil

n 2 tablespoons coarse salt

n 2 large cloves garlic

Utensils

n a shallow dish

n wide saucepan,

n foodprocessor

n sterilised storage jar

Method:

n Hull, pip and cut the peppers into strips lengthwise. Layer them in a shallow dish with the salt. Leave overnight. Pour off the salty juices.

n Heat the oil gently in a saucepan and put in the peppers. Leave barely to simmer, uncovered, for an hour in the oil.

n By the end most of the juices should have evaporated and the peppers will have a gently roasted flavour.

n Peel and roughly chop the garlic.

n Put the peppers, the oil in which they cooked, and the garlic into the food processor and blend to a paste.

n Bottle, seal and keep in a cool larder or in the fridge.