Mixed Israeli Salad

This tasty salad is a classic in Israel. It was "invented" in the kibbuzim as part of the communal breakfast – which is hardly surprising as all the ingredients can be picked fresh from the fields every morning. Even today the salad appears on many a family’s breakfast table in Israel.

What is special about this salad is how finely the ingredients are chopped. As a rule, it contains tomatoes, cucumbers, and onions and these have to be cut into tini-tiny bits – the smaller, the better. The ideal size is half the fingernail on your little finger!

There is a story of an Israeli spy who, plying his trade in Egypt, blew his cover because of his habit of cutting his vegetables into tiny cubes. He was arrested and ultimately executed.

Kibbuz, Hebrew for "gathering", plural: kibbutzim; a type of settlement first established in Palestine in 1909 and later in Israel, organized along Socialist principles.