Anyway, I was craving pasta and the basil in the garden is so beautiful, it just made sense to harvest some and make this dish.

I thought garlic toast would be a good  side to the pasta. I spread a thin layer of homemade garlic sauce on toasted bread, topped that with a few of the whole basil leaves, which was then topped with mozzarella cheese, and a little Italian seasoning. Put it under the broiler for a few minutes, until the cheese is bubbly and melted.

Here’s my quick and delicious recipe. Hope you give it a try.

Crostini with Burrata, Basil and Sundried Tomatoes

Crostini, in Italian means “little toasts”. They are made by slicing bread very thin and then toasting it until it becomes crisp. I love using a sourdough baguette to make mine because each crostini is the perfect size to easily hold in your hand. If I need/want to have bigger crostini I use ciabatta.

Crostini can be eaten plain or used as the base for appetizers. Here are some of our favorites… warm fresh mozzarella with prosciutto and crispy sage; cream cheese with smoked salmon, capers and red onion; ricotta, basil and sundried tomato puree; wild mushroom with goat cheese, sliced marinated beef with mustard sauce, etc… the variations are endless.

I usually serve crostini instead of crackers. It’s perfect with all kinds of cheese and dips. They also make great croutons for soup, plain or with a little cheese melted on them. I’ve even broken a few up and tossed them on my salad.

For my recipe below I just used salt and pepper, but If you’d like, you can use your favorite herbs and spices. I sometimes take a clove of garlic and rub it on each warm crostini right when they come out of the oven.  I love the way the garlic just melts into the warm toasted bread. Then you can top them however you want.

One baguette makes approximately 50 crostini.

INGREDIENTS
1 baguette (I buy the sourdough baguette from Trader Joe’s)
½ cup of olive oil
sea salt
ground black pepper

METHOD
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Cut the baguette into thin even slices. Place slices on a baking sheet and drizzle with olive oil. Season with sea salt and ground black pepper.

Place in oven and bake for about 15 minutes, or until crisp and a light golden color. Keep an eye on them, as they can burn easily.

You can store crostini easily at room temperature in an airtight container for about a week but, with the way we all love them, they never last that long around our household!

It’s difficult to find a tomato at the grocery store that tastes the way I remember them. Sure, a few hybrid varieties have been developed for great flavor. However, commercial tomato breeders focus on hybridizing tomatoes to make them symmetrical and red, durable enough to survive the automated harvesting and long-distance shipping, picked green, with no chance to ripen on the vine, and a long shelf life. Unfortunately, something had to go and sadly, for us tomato lovers, it was flavor.

That’s why I love to go to the farmer’s markets in search of beautiful heirloom tomatoes. Heirloom tomatoes come in various shapes, sizes, and colors. But what they all have in common is they have been sown from seeds passed down from generation to generation, because of valued characteristics.

There is simply no comparison to the grainy, dry, flavorless things you find at the supermarket. Homegrown heirloom tomatoes are juicy, delicious, sweet and tangy. They have a marvelous mouth-watering, warm-from-the-sun, old-fashioned tomato taste you may remember.

Celebrate the end of summer with some beautiful heirloom tomatoes. Below are two great recipes from my kitchen to yours.

INGREDIENTS
6 slices firm white sandwich bread
1/4 lb sliced bacon (about 5 slices)
6 Tbsp olive oil
1/4 cup finely chopped shallot
3 Tbsp Sherry vinegar
4 assorted medium heirloom tomatoes (2 lb total), cut into 1/4- to 1/3-inch-thick slices
30 small fresh basil leaves
1 1/2 oz blue cheese (preferably Maytag Blue), crumbled, at room temperature
Special equipment: a 3-inch round cookie cutter
Garnish: very small heirloom cherry or currant tomatoes

METHOD
Cut 1 round from each bread slice with cookie cutter.

Cook bacon in a 10-inch heavy skillet over moderate heat until crisp, then transfer to paper towels to drain. Pour off bacon fat from skillet and reserve fat (do not clean skillet).

Heat 1 1/2 tablespoons oil in skillet over moderate heat until hot but not smoking, then toast 3 bread rounds, turning over once, until golden brown, about 3 minutes total. Transfer toasts to a rack to cool and season with salt and pepper. Toast remaining 3 bread rounds in 1 1/2 tablespoons more oil in same manner.

Cook shallot in 2 tablespoons reserved bacon fat and remaining 3 tablespoons oil in a small heavy saucepan over moderate heat, stirring, until softened, about 2 minutes. Add vinegar and simmer, whisking, until emulsified, about 1 minute. Season dressing with salt and pepper and keep warm, covered.

Crumble bacon. Arrange bread rounds on 6 plates and divide tomato slices among them, stacking slices and sprinkling some basil and bacon between slices. Sprinkle cheese and remaining basil and bacon over and around tomatoes.