If you like stuff on toast and Italian flavors, this ricotta toast or bruschetta will become a favorite. It combines the creaminess of ricotta with juicy tomatoes and bits of crispy bacon. But first, the toasted bread is rubbed with garlic cloves to add an extra layer of yum!
Few ingredients and LOTS of flavor! Stuff on toast doesn't get much better. And SO easy to make.
What is a toast or bruschetta?
A piece of bread topped with ingredients meant to be eaten with your hands. In Italian is bruschetta, in French, it's tartine (like the strawberry tartine) and tostas in Spain. And for the English-speaking countries, I guess it's toast.
For this recipe, the bread slices are first toasted in the oven with olive oil and rubbed with fresh garlic cloves immediately after taking them out.
The bread baked with oil is in itself a great idea. With the rubbed garlic, which disintegrates a bit and impregnates into the toast until it becomes part of the crunchiness, it is memorable.
I grew up eating Italian food, which is extremely popular and a staple here in Buenos Aires. Together with steak, of course. Weekends, eating pasta with rich tomato sauce and homemade potato gnocchi. Or risotto, as I grew older and my palate dared incorporate new ideas.
The bacon bits are a new addition. And who can argue with the exponential improvement bacon brings to a recipe like this one, right? They round up this appetizer.
All the ingredients in this tomato bruschetta are staples in my kitchen, sometimes used for baking too, such as the lemon ricotta cake (amazing recipe, you should try it).
I find that well-seasoned regular ricotta works best here, better than the firmer ones (ricotta salata is one) because they are easier to slather and have some extra moisture that balances the bread well. The crunchy, salty bacon bits add a lot, though be careful not to overwhelm the toast with it. And tomatoes are always better if they are in season and heirloom, but cherry tomatoes work too, and they are easily available year-round.
An easy appetizer with all your favorite Italian flavors, great to use those last summer tomatoes that will very soon disappear.
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Ricotta Tomato Toast
Ingredients
- 10 bread slices, rustic or artisan bread preferably, like the semolina bread
- 5 garlic cloves, peeled and cut in half
- 1 cup whole milk ricotta, about 9 ounces
- 1 cup cherry tomatoes, 5 to 6 ounces, cut in half
- 3.5 ounces bacon, cooked until crisp and crumbled
- ½ teaspoon sea salt, or to taste
- ⅛ teaspoon black pepper, or to taste
- 2 tablespoons olive oil, to drizzle before serving
- 1 teaspoon red wine vinegar
- chopped chives or ciboulette, to sprinkle before serving
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 40ºF (200ºC).
- Place 10 bread slices on a baking sheet and drizzle olive oil on both sides.
- Bake for 15-20 minutes, or until golden.
- Take out from the oven and immediately rub them with 2 ½ garlic cloves on one of the sides.
- Mix 1 cup cherry tomatoes, halved or in chunks with 2 tablespoons olive oil and 1 teaspoon red wine vinegar. Reserve.
- Mix 1 cup whole milk ricotta with ½ teaspoon sea salt, ⅛ teaspoon black pepper, some chopped chives or ciboulette and a drizzle of olive oil. Make sure it is well salted and tasty.
- Mound a tablespoon or so of ricotta on each bread slice.
- Top with tomatoes, 3.5 ounces bacon bits divided equally, chives, black pepper and olive oil.
- Eat immediately.
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