Tomato Toast

Hey foodie friends!

I wonder how many of you are in the same boat as me right now.

My apartment has z e r o breakfast ingredients with the exception of coffee; my lunches consist of the most obscure ingredients, and then dinner seems to magically appear as if I wasn’t just pacing around my kitchen all day thinking of what to eat. Here’s the thing: I can handle not having a breakfast (although I do miss it) and dinner will always be something I look forward to, but lunch is a whole other story.

Lunch is my Everest.

So I started looking at what I had lying around and challenged myself to make something that still resembles a composed meal using 5 ingredients or less. I had cherry tomatoes on their way out, the last two slices of toast bread. a whole hunk of garlic left, leftover dill from Mom’s Potato Salad and some Boursin left all by its lonesome. Seemed like it could work? I took the plunge for you guys.

AND THEN, I remembered that Brad Leone from Bon Appetit made Charred Tomatoes on Toast on his show It’s Alive. Brad is a loveable guy with such great character and he never fails to make me laugh when I watch his content. Truthfully some of the things he makes on his show seem so simple but yet, elevated with a few techniques. This tomato toast was the perfect example of that and I realized I basically had all the ingredients in one way or another. So alas, here is LG,BE’s version of Tomato Toast.

INGREDIENTS

• Baby tomatoes, as many as you want
• Toast bread–toasted, duh
• 2 garlic cloves, peeled and smashed whole
• 1/4 cup of Boursin
  substitutes: you can also use ricotta like Brad does,
  a whipped cream cheese, softened goat cheese, etc.
• 1 zest of a lemon
• Fresh herbs — dill, basil, oregano
• Olive oil
• Salt and pepper
• Crushed red pepper flakes — optional , 1/4 tsp.
  

1. In a medium frying pan, heat up about 1 tablespoon of olive oil on medium heat. Add the garlic cloves, red chilli flakes if using, and the tomatoes once preheated and allow them to cook down for at least 10 minutes, stirring gently now and then. Remove from heat and allow to cool slightly.

2. In a small bowl, add the boursin, lemon zest, a glug of olive oil, salt, pepper, and roughly chopped herbs. Stir together until soft and easily spreadable. Toast your bread at this time!

3. Take the garlic cloves from the tomato pan and using the back of the knife, press down and slide the knife along the cloves until they create a garlic paste. Add this to the tomatoes, as well as another 1/4 of the fresh herbs and combine together.

4. Spread your herby, lemony Boursin mixture onto a piece of toast and spoon the tomatoes on top, using all of the extra juices and flavour that’s been pooling up at the bottom of the pan. Drizzle with some more olive oil, more fresh herbs and sprinkle with salt and pepper.

What I like about this dish is that it’s very intuitive for a home cook which also makes it super easy to replicate. All of these ingredients–tomatoes, olive oil, garlic and herbs–go exceptionally well together, and Brad Leone makes that very clear that it’s okay to go with the flow when you’re cooking, and it’s a motto I tell my friends too!

Enjoy guys, and peace and good eats.
-A❁