Bruschetta with Cherry Tomato Tapenade

Just a quick post this afternoon (before my guests arrive) to share with you a recipe my hubby made for our lunch yesterday.  I had mentioned this to a friend and she was happy to hear I was going to share it here on my blog.  If you try this recipe let me know what you thought!  We had it for lunch again today!!

Bruschetta with Cherry Tomato Tapenade

Recipe originally by Fabio Viviani ... modified/IMPROVED by Mark Pavlick

Ingredients:

2 cups cherry tomatoes (you can use red & yellow - we just used red)

1/2 cups kalamata olives, pitted

6-8 green onions, chopped

1/3 cup pine nuts (toasted)

fresh ground pepper and kosher salt

8-10 leaves fresh basil, torn, plus more for garnish

1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil, plus extra for drizzling

2 oz. block Parmesan cheese, cubed, plus additional Parmesan for grating

1 Italian or French baguette

1 or 2 cloves of garlic 

Method:

Place the green onions, pine nuts, pinch of salt/pepper, olive oil, garlic and Parmesan cubes into a food processor and PULSE to chop.

Add the tomatoes, olives and basil to the food processor and using the PULSE button on your food processor, combine and chop the ingredients until well combined.  Be careful NOT to OVER-PROCESS!

Remove the tapenade to a medium sized bowl.  Drizzle with a touch more olive oil as needed and combine.

Preheat a grill pan over medium-high heat.

Slice the bread on an angle in generous, uniform pieces.  Top with olive oil and a light sprinkle of salt.

Place on the preheated grill pan and cook until grill marks appear.

To Serve:

Top each warm slice of grilled bread with a generous amount of tapenade.  Garnish with chopped basil, fresh ground pepper, a drizzle of olive oil and freshly grated Parmesan.

This is such a yummy treat!

We felt the recipe had enough basil in it that we did not add any additional to the top and as you can see, the cubes of Parmesan in the recipe will melt nicely when heated.

I used my counter top convection oven for the broiling.  Didn't take but a few minutes.  Yesterday I gauged the time by the melting process of the SHREDDED cheese on top ... today I GRATED the cheese so I had to keep a closer eye on them.  Probably no more than 5 minutes ... depending on your oven.

 ENJOY!

I'd better get back to the kitchen and help hubby prepare for this evenings grilling dinner and guests.  

Please come back tomorrow when I have another Crafty Secrets project/tutorial to share with you!

Hope to see you then!

As always . . .