A Fresh Summer Garden Baguette
A colorful blend of fresh garden herbs and nuts spread between slices of tomato on a crispy baguette. Basil and tomatos are a great combination; add in some nuts and garlic and it’s a match made in heaven.
Whenever I make this, I think of sunshine, the garden, BBQ, friends, and sangria. Now that summer is just around the corner, this is the perfect dish to whip out to bring to your next party. I made this for the first time 4 years ago at a CSA BBQ party at my house and it was all gone within 10 minutes! Ever since, this has been on the top of my “favourite party foods” list. It’s a great starter that promises to tickle all your summer garden taste buds. Enjoy! 😀
Prep Time: 25 mins
Cook Time: 10-11 minutes
Portion: 4-6 people
Ingredients:
- 1 large baguette
- 2 packs fresh basil (~40 g total)
- 1 pack Italian parsley (~25g)
- 7-8 cloves garlic
- handful pine nuts (~25g)
- handful pistachios (~25g)
- 1/3 cup olive oil
- 1 tsp salt+ 1 tsp pepper (more or less to taste)
- 3 large tomatos (try to find ones about the same width as your baguette so it fits nicely inside)
Timer: 0 minutes
1. Prepare the tomatos
Slice the tomatos thinly to about half a cm thick
Remove the seeds and excess water from the tomatos so that they won’t make the bread soggy
Timer: 7 minutes
2. Prepare your pesto sauce
The ingredients for the pesto sauce
Grinding tips:
*Start from the smallest to largest size
*Do NOT add liquids (olive oil) until all the solids are ground or else the blender will not be able to catch them in the knife
Grind the pine nuts first, then pistachios
Once ground finely, add the garlic
The ground nuts + garlic mixture
Add the basil and parsley bit by bit
Alternate between the oil and herbs to smooth out the blending process
Add salt+pepper to taste
Once blended smoothly, this is what the pesto should look like- a beautiful green color and slightly runny
Timer: 17 minutes
3. Slice the baguette
Use a jagged knife to cut bread- it grabs onto the bread better creating cleaner cuts
I’m cutting around 1cm thick slices
Leave a small edge connected on the side so it doesn’t fall apart
Now all your ingredients are ready!
Timer: 20 minutes
4. Fill up the baguette!
Spread a generous layer of pesto on 1 side of each slice
Place a slice of tomato on each slice
Timer: 25 minutes
5. Bake for 10-11 minutes at 200 degrees Celsius
*If you are bringing this to someone else’s house, I would suggest you to bake it at their place so that it can be served fresh from the oven.
Timer: 35 minutes
The final product:
Serve fresh out of the oven.
The outside is warm and crispy, while the insides are still soft and the flavors of the pesto and tomatos blended together
*With a Twist: for all my cheese lovers, try adding a slice of meltable cheese along with the tomatos*
I really hope you try this next time you have a party, I promise your guests will love it! 🙂
I had so much fun making this for this blog- it turned out to be a great late night snack for Bosco and I, hahaha.
Be in love with life.
Much love,
CC
What a fun recipe! I can’t wait to try this!
This is such a nice & creative idea! I bet that tastes way better than plain old garlic bread. : )
Thank you!! I really do love this
Recipe, it’s so easy to put together and people really love it at parties, I hope you can try it out one day 🙂
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