by Coltrane
The recipe is basically Mark Bittman’s, from How To Cook Everything, 10th Anniversary Edition. I used french bread that I’d made the day before. The bread hadn’t risen like I would have liked — it wound up relatively too dense to use as “bread”, so I repurposed it into these crostini.
This crostini recipe didn’t quite use up all of the bread I’d made — the remaining bread became Bittman’s French Toast. The French toast was also quite good. That book has yet to let me down.
The crostini ingredients:
| 8” of | Baugette, cut into 1/2” rounds |
| 15 oz can or | Whole Tomatoes, seeded and diced |
| 6 large | Roma Tomatoes, seeded and diced |
| 10 large | Basil Leaves, chiffonade |
| 4 TBP | Blue Cheese, in small pieces |
| 2 TBP | Pecorino Romano, in small pieces |
| 1 clove | Garlic, minced |
| Sea Salt or Kosher Salt | |
| Extra Virgin Olive Oil for brushing | |
| Garlic clove cut in half |
I used canned tomatoes in this recipe and it went over well. Roma tomatoes would be good too. My advice would be to go with whatever you have on hand.
Directions:
Place the tomatoes in a colander and drain for a few minutes. Heat broiler and adjust the rack to 4″ from the heat. Place the bread onto a cookie sheet or equivalent. Lightly brush the bread slices on both sides with olive oil. Place the cookie sheet under the broiler to lightly brown the first side of the bread. (This will take 2-4 minutes.) Turn and brown the other side. Don’t walk away from the bread while it’s under the broiler, as the bread will go from “toasty” to “setting off the fire alarm” in about 30 seconds. Rub the crostini with the halved garlic clove.
Combine the tomato, basil, cheeses, minced garlic, and the two tablespoons of olive oil. Mix to combine and salt to taste (about 1/2 tsp). Distribute the tomato mixture on the crostini rounds. Finish with a drizzle of olive oil.
As for what happens when you get wrapped up in taking pictures and forget about the bread under the broiler…
FlatbreadGarden 