The Kitchen Door

Remember in one of the opening scenes of the movie Julie and Julia when Julie is making bruschetta? 

I do. Oh boy oh boy I do. I love bruschetta and the best thing about it is that it is healthy. Why, you could eat it everyday you could and never bat a guilty eye.

When I saw that scene in the movie, of all the dishes that were cinematically recreated that one had the most appeal for me. 

Now, in the movie the character named Julie, fries her baguette. For this technique and because I wanted to try and recreate it as I imagined it to taste, I fried my bread too. BUT… for those of us who are counting calories… you certainly do not have to fry the bread and you can use any type of righteous bread that your conscience will allow. But just make sure that you toast it and that you use the roasted garlic. You can’t mess up bruschetta.

 This isn’t really a recipe so much as a technique so feel free to “tweak” it as you please.

The only advance prep work that you will need is to roast a garlic bulb.

Click here for a great tutorial on roasting garlic.

Bruschetta like on Julie and Julia

Serves 4-6

The Ingredients

• 1 lb fresh and fully ripe tomatoes
• ½ cup of fresh basil (feel free to play with this amount... when we're talking fresh basil... the sky is the limit... or money or availability)
• salt and (freshly cracked) pepper
• slices of crusty French bread (about ¾ inch slices)
• roasted garlic bulbs
• butter and olive oil mixed (about 2 TBS of mixture at a time into pan)

The Instructions

1. Chop the tomatoes and chop the basil; mix them together in a bowl. Season with salt and freshly ground black pepper. Set aside.
2. Heat the butter and oil mixture until butter is melted and starting to foam but not brown.
3. Toast the bread slices in this mixture. Remove from pan and place on paper towels to absorb any excess oils.
4. Spread a small amount of roasted garlic onto each piece of toasted bread.
5. 
Drain tomato basil mixture of excess juices and spoon on top of toast.
6. Top with a thin slice of fresh parmesan cheese.

By: The Kitchen Door

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