Shopska salad

Shopska salad(Bulgarian,MacedonianandSerbian:Шопска салата;Croatian:Šopska salata;Romanian:Salata bulgărească;Czech:Šopský salát;Albanian:Sallatë Fshati;Hungarian:Sopszka saláta;Greek:Σαλάτα σόπσκα) is a coldsaladpopular throughoutSoutheastern Europe.It isBulgaria'smost famous salad andnational dish.
The dish is made fromtomatoes,cucumbers,onion/scallions, raw or roastedpeppers, andsirene, a white brined cheese similar to feta.The vegetables are usually diced and salted, followed by a light dressing ofsunflower oil(orolive oil, which is less authentic),which is occasionally complemented byvinegar. The addition of vinegar contributes, however, to the sour flavour that the tomatoes impart. In restaurants, the dressings are provided separately. Lastly, the vegetables are covered in a thick layer of grated or dicedsirenecheese. This salad is often consumed as an appetizer withrakia.
According to food anthropologist Rayna Gavrilova, the dish is commonly accompanied by a shot ofapricotor other fruit brandy.
Tomatoes appeared in Southeastern Europe in the mid-1800s.
In the post-war socialist era,Balkantouristfocused on marketing Bulgaria'sBlack Sea coastas a tourist destination for Bulgarians and for western tourists as a way of showcasing the socialist "good life".This included reinventing and remarketing regional dishes to identify them as Bulgarian rather than simply Eastern European.The Shopska salad is a variation on aGreek saladof cucumbers, tomatoes, and feta; Balkantourist in 1956 named their version Shopska salad.The salad's colors, which mimic those of the Bulgarian flag, were a happy coincidence that was seen as a positive for evoking a national sentiment.
Despite the fact that the salad's name comes from the westernmost Bulgarian region calledShopluk, it first appeared at the Black Sea coast, in a resort nearVarna, calledDruzhbain the restaurant "Chernomorets".It can be found in one of the first state-approved cookbooks from 1956 (Sbornik recepti 1956, vol. 1, p. 50).The development and popularization of the salad is attributed to a leader in Bulgarian tourismPetar Doychev(1924–2019).
The dish was initially served in Bulgaria only in the hotels of Balkantourist.It is the only survivor of five or six recipes similarly created for and marketed by the tourism industry.It became an emblem of Bulgarian tourism.It was approved as a national culinary symbol during the 1970s and 1980s.In 2014 Shopska salad was Bulgaria's most recognizable dish in Europe. It was the most popular recipe in aEuropean Parliamentinitiative calledA Taste of Europe.
According to the Bulgarian edition ofDeutsche Welle, the Balkantourist recipe spread from Bulgaria to the cuisine of neighboring countries.Deutsche Wellenoted a restaurant in Croatia claimed the salad as a Croatian national dish.According to Radio Bulgaria and the Sofia News Agency, Serbian newspaperPolitikain the 2000s claimed the salad as Serbian rather than Bulgarian, Macedonian or Czech.Although the salad was promoted on the Black Sea coast, because its name refers to the area of Shopluk -- which is divided among Bulgaria, Serbia and North Macedonia -- after thebreakup of Yugoslavia, chefs in those areas began to contest the Bulgarian origin of the salad.
Bulgaria requestedprotected geographical indicationfrom the European Union; Serbia objected.