This turned out to be an excellent use for some tomatoes that had sat on the kitchen counter a bit too long and had become soft but were still sound.
As is typical for my recipes written up from cooking on the fly the ingredients and instructions are not precise. I'm not at all sure about the baking time for this recipe since I baked this batch in my wood burning Beehive Oven in the falling heat after baking some bread.
Core the tomatoes and cut them in half horizontal to the stem ends. Place them cut side up in a baking dish that has been smeared with some olive oil. Sprinkle the cut sides of the tomatoes with some salt and fresh ground pepper and scatter some chopped basil on top.
Whirl a few slices of stale but not dry rustic bread (you can leave the crusts on), preferably part whole wheat, in a blender to make medium fine crumbs. Heat a couple of tablespoons olive oil over medium heat in a saute pan. Add a couple of cloves of chopped garlic and stir briefly, add the bread crumbs and some crushed dried oregano and some crushed red pepper flakes to the pan and saute until the bread crumbs become crispy. Mound the crispy bread crumbs onto the tomatoes. Pour a couple of tablespoons of dry vermouth into the pan and bake in a 350F oven until the tomatoes are hot, about 20 to 30 minutes perhaps. Serve immediately.
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| Natural Yeast Bread baked in my Beehive Oven |
When I fire up the Beehive Oven I like to take full advantage if I have the time and the other day I did. I used the hot coals left from the fire that I made in the oven to heat it up to roast some red peppers and used them in one of my husband's favorite salads. The recipe is from one of my favorite Spanish cookbooks La Cocina de Mama by Penelope Casas.
The oven is very hot, about 600F when I put the bread into it. By the time the bread is done the oven has cooled to about 350F and I can put other dishes into it to bake in the falling heat. I managed to assemble the squash blossoms and tomatoes in time to get them into the oven as soon as the bread came out. We had quite a feast that night.
Now I have total oven envy. Yummmmm.
ReplyDeleteThe tomatoes look good, but it's the bread that really gets me. I just can't get my inside oven hot enough. Oh well.
I've got oven envy too! The inside oven's banned in the summer, but sometimes you just need an oven. Those tomatoes look good.
ReplyDeleteOooooooooooohhhhhh, I'm hungry, look at those stuffed squash flowers, tomatoes, and heavenly wood oven baked bread!
ReplyDeleteDo you grind your own grains and flours?
Oh my, this looks absolutely delicious!
ReplyDeleteStefaneener, I know how you feel, I lusted after a wood burning oven for years. The little Beehive has turned out to be great. I can bake a decent loaf in my regular oven with a baking stone, but the beehinve turns out much nicer loaves, I've spoiled myself now.
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Jan, oh the little beehive would be just right for you then. I can't use it very often in the winter because you can't let it get wet and you can't put the cover on if it's warm. And I don't really want to bake outside during the winter anyway... It's imported from your part of the world, basically, Portugal.
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mac, I'm not quite that fanatic about my bread, I buy my flours. Don't go giving me any wild ideas now though... :-)
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meemsync, thanks!
Wow all your food creations always look so delicious! The beehive oven is really cool - you would think it would crack under heat that high. It must make wonderful bread.
ReplyDeleteI LOVE your beehive oven! I MUST find one now.
ReplyDeleteP.S. That bread looks amazing.
Your oven is crack Michelle! Squash blossoms look good, too.
ReplyDeleteOh that sounds yummy.
ReplyDeleteA Kitchen Garden, thank you! Actually, the oven does develop a whole network of cracks over time but that doesn't reduce its functionality. It is great for baking bread and pizza too, that's really why I got, for the pizza.
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Thomas, Thanks, I've been working on my bread baking skills, especially after I moved to this area and couldn't find a good rustic bread to buy. I got so spoiled in the SF bay area, there are so many great artisan bakers there. Alfresco Imports is the place I got the Beehive, there's a link on the post that I linked to above.
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Julie, thank you!
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Daphne, It's hard to go wrong with home grown tomatoes. Mmmm.
Lucky you with a good beehive oven to bake in! The tomatoes look delicious but the bread and roasted peppers are what have me drooling over the keyboard. You certainly make good use of the oven while it is hot!
ReplyDeleteYou stepped right out of Sunset Magazine with this blog post. Quintessential Claifornia living. :)
ReplyDeleteIt all looks delish ! The beehive oven is too cool, that bread looks amazing ! So pretty !
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