Crostini Weekend!

Crostini, if you haven't had them (and I bet you have) are little toasted pieces of bread topped with yummy goodness. Really, you can make them with just about anything you have on hand. They make great snacks, appetizers, or, in our case tonight, dinner.

Yesterday I baked up my second loaf of No Knead Bread (you might recall the first loaf, posted here). This time around, I went for roasted garlic and Asiago cheese. I followed the basic instructions and let the dough sit overnight. The following morning, I roasted a whole bulb of garlic. I then added the freshly roasted cloves to the risen dough (I just pressed them into the loaf). Then I sprinkled grated Asiago over the whole thing and plopped it into my heated Le Crueset to bake. 45 minutes later, Mike ventured downstairs for a taste of the fresh baked loaf.

I'll admit, since we were planning on eating out with Mike's Cove friends, I'd planned on wrapping the loaf for tonight (still working on my timing so I have a fresh loaf with my meals). But since I couldn't let him have first bite without diving in myself, I made a half batch of the Walnut Pesto recipe posted by Smitten Kitchen here.

This was my first time trying the pesto and it was fantastic! We sliced up a little bit of a leftover brie wheel to go along with it and had a tasty and elegant snack. This particular bread method results in a really crusty bread that I find is perfect for crostini. Trust me, we'll be doing this again as a fairly inexpensive appetizer when we have company.

Tonight, I'm continuing the crostini trend with Anne Burrell's recipe for Grilled Eggplant and Ricotta Crostini (using one of the eggplants from my produce delivery). I'm also going to attempt my first Caponata (our friend's mom makes a great one -- I don't have her recipe yet, so I'm playing with one I found this week. We'll see how it turns out.) I'm hoping it'll be a bit of a lighter meal considering how much I've indulged lately (more posts on that to come!).