Bruschetta with Tomatoes (and Basil)

“Bruschetta with Tomatoes recipe, and the easy way to deal with the preparation of tomato toppings!”

As I mentioned in my review of cook-off of Julie & Julia’s menu, Bruschetta is an Italian bread dish than French recipe, to be exact. However, I learnt this great light bites, and would like to share its simple making yet delicious recipe to you.

This is light snack which may be taken as appetizer, to indulge it during tea break, and even as your favourite TV bites. I liked bruschetta with tamatoes, because it tastes very refreshing. This fruit is high anti-oxidant properties which help to fight free radical in our body, and hence, reduce rish of getting cancer. For any one who does not to eat tomato, this is the greatest way to try having it! Having the tomato in bruschetta makes its taste and texture much more palatable.

There are three ways to prepare the tomatoes..

With large tomato, you may choose to eat it with skin or without skin. If these are the only two choices, I would personally prefer to eat it without skin as it yields smoother consistency in the palate to go without its skin. Its smoother, softer and easier to bite texture complements the crunchy toasted bread so well, but of course, this great bite comes with your contribution of more time and effort.

Steps to peel tomato skin:
Firstly, you have to cut a shallow cross on the bottom of the large tomato as this way will aid in the actual peeling of the tomato later, but do not remove the stem on the top part. Then, prepare a pot of iced water and another pot of boiling water. Place tomato into boiling water for 10 seconds, and then, quickly remove it from water, and let it cool by placing it into iced water for a few seconds. Begin peeling from the shallow cross you have made right at the begining. The skin of the tomato should be very easily peeled, by now. Then, dice it.

Steps to dice tomato:
Halves the tomato. Sit one halves on its flat area on a clean chopping board. Then, run your knife over to slice it, but it will be easier if you leave the stem at the top part unsliced, so that the tomato slices will be intact in an organised way. Now, cut the tomato slices crosswise into dices. discard the stem portion.

See recipe of Bruschetta now:

Ingredients
Baguette, sliced into 1cm thick, lengthwise
6 cloves of roasted garlic in Olive oil (retained 1 teaspoon of olive oil)
Pinch of salt

1 regular bowl of cherry tomato (about 15 pcs), halves (or 2 large tomatoes, skinned and diced)
4 cloves of roasted garlic
¾ teaspoon of white wine vinegar
¾ teaspoon of sugar
A gentle touch of salt

Garnish:
1 – 2 stem of fresh Basil leave, finely chopped
Freshly grounded black pepper

Method

1) Preheat oven at 200°C. Mash roasted garlic with olive oil and salt. Combine well. Spread the mashed garlic on each slice of baguette and place on a baking dish. Bake at center rack for 10 minutes, or until lightly browned. Reserve for later.

2) Place diced/ halved tomato in a bowl. Add roasted garlic, salt, sugar and white wine vinegar and toss it well.

3) Top toasted baguette with tomatoes. Sprinkle some black pepper, and lastly, garnish with chopped Basil leave. Serve.

Tips: If you are using blanched tomato dices as topping, mix salt and other seasoning/ condiments only at the very last step, right before serving it on the baguette. Adding salt to the diced tomato too early may extract the water from the tomato flesh and makes the tomato toppings too wet to be used later.
* If you do not have white wine vinegar, use any other type of vinegar or lemon juice. You may also opt it out, if wished.