Bruschetta

Traditionally Bruschietta was made using toasted Chiabatta which is an Italian coarse bread made often with walnut meal. It is topped with olive oil then rubbed with fresh garlic.

Traditionally in Itally the olives are taken to the local mill for pressing in November and December. This is a whole day job and the growers bring dry stale coase bread with them for their midday meal. There is usually a small fireplace in the corner of the pressing room, and they toast their bread over this. When the virgin olive oil emerges from the press, the grower dips the bread into a sample of the new season's olive oil. The next step is rubbing the toasted bread with garlic. Then, it is finished off with small, diced onions. In this typical Italian olive farming tradition the new seasons oil is sampled, stale bread is put to good use and the grower has a tasty lunch.

At the Olive Press

Italian families coming to Australia, after the war were used to harsh conditions and frugal living. They adapted this tradition to create a uniqure fare that became popular as a low cost finger food at social gatherings. It is usually used as as appetiser here, particularly at parties where alcohol is consumed but a meal is not being served, to make sure no-one is drinking on an empty stomach.

Over time there have been many variations and new toppings have been added. As the children of these immigrant Italians grew up their traditions passed into what has become today's "Aussie culture" - a rich tapestry of many cultures, each from a different wave of immigrants coming here, determined to leave their problems behind and make a new, peaceful and prosperous life in Australia.

Today bruschetta has evolved from a cheap subsistance farmers lunch into a gourmet entree. In many restuarants they use bruschietta as an entree and when you see how cheap it is to make, you can understand why!

Mimenta's Povobruschetta

Here is some we made on slices of a french stick, using diced fresh tomatoes, onions and fetta cheese. A great luch or the ideal light meal on a hot Aussie summer evening. You are supposed to use the proper ciabatta bread but Hey! - we're cutting costs here!

Povobruschetta make with slices of french stick loaf.

For the base, you will need:

Bread - Two thick toast slices per person for a filling snack or light lunch.
Virgin Olive Oil - Must be olive oil - no substitutes taste the same.
Garlic - 1 clove per person. Adjust amount if using Pearl or Russian giant garlic, (see the Garlic page ).
Salt and Black pepper to taste

Virgin Olive Oil is a greenish yellow colour and contains many beneficial antioxidants

The Base

Here's how you make your base:. Simply use any thick sliced bread. The garlic has to be real cloves. The garlic paste, preserved garlic and garlic salt come out with a burned rubber after taste. If you don't have real garlic, then leave it out completely.

• Toast your bread lightly golden brown on both sides in the oven, on a griller tray.
  
  
• In a small bowl, crush 4 cloves of garlic and mix with virgin olive oil. Don't make too much because you will only use this on half the povobruschietta. The other half will have olive oil without the garlic.
  
  
• Divide your toasted bread into two batches and brush the toasted bread with your olive oil lightly on one side only. Do this to one batch with the garlic oil, the other with plain virgin olive oil.
  
  
• Sprinkle with salt and fresh ground black pepper.
  
  
• Add your topping and place back in the oven until the fetta cheese has melted. Note use a bulgarian fetta or one with some full flavour and a bit of a bite.
  
  
• Take out of oven, place on a chopping board and cut into half or quarters while still hot and serve.

Pure Extra Virgin Olve oil is actually green

Povobruschietta Toppings

Roasted Garlic - see the roasted garlic recipe section.

• Simply break apart the roasted garlic into cloves.
• Squeeze out the roasted clove and spread with a knife.
• Cover with thinly sliced fresh tomato and capsicum.
• Top with fetta and a sprinkling of mild (sweet) paprika to add some colour.

Asparagus and Capsicum - This is great accompaniment for the roasted garlic topping because it makes a nice colour contrast.

• Either steam some fresh asparagus until it is soft or use the tinned variety. Either way it's cheap because you use so little.
• Finely dice an onion ands sprinkle over yoiur base.
• Mash the asparagus onto the base.
• Dice some red capsicum over the top and cover with some fetta cheese.

Olives and sundried tomato - a definite antpasto flavour that goes well with wine. This is best when strong flavoured olives are used. I suggest Kalamata pitted black olives. Note - olives must be pitted. You don't want your parties remembered for cracked teeth!

• Cut the olives in half and cut the dried tomato to approximately the same size peices
• Dce a small onion
• Chop up some fresh basil
• Mix the lot in a bowl with some virgin olive oil
• Place on base and cover with fetta cheese

Anchovy (or Oysters) and Spring onions - Anchovies are too strongly fishy for most people but this one gets aropund that and it makes so much topping, you'll think your performing the 5 loaves and fishes miracle all over again!
This works for oysters as well - use about 6 oystersn to replace the anchovies.

• Put two heaped desert spoons of flour in a small saucepan
• Add a desert spoon sized knob of butter and heat. Stir continuously until the flou has turned a light biscuit colour
• Cut up about ten anchovies and put in the small saucepan
• Add milk to make a thick sauce.
• Add some Oyster sauce for colour. (if you want it really fishy, add some asian fish sauce. . . sparingly!)
• Chop up some spring onions fine and add to the sauce as it cools.
• Put a teaspoon of this on your base and cover with a thin slice of cheese (doesn't have to be fetta)
• Grill until the cheese is molten.

Cinnamon (or Cardamom) Lime and Chicken - This is distinctly Indonesian in flavour. Cardamom can also be used but grind it up very fine so it is not gritty. This is a taste sensation that will have them mugging you for the recipe. You can substitute a lemon for the lime to cut costs. You'll get a different flavour but still sensational. I also add a dash of sweet chilli sauce as well.

• Grate the outer green skin off a lime (but not the white pith underneath), with a fine grater to make a lime zest.
• Juice the grated lime into a small bowl.
• Break up the half the breast meat of a cooked chicken into small peices and place in the lime juice.
• Grind up two pinches of cardamom seeds and an eighth of a cinnamon stick (cut up into flakes with scissors).
• Add the spices to the bowl with the chicken and lime and add a small quantity of tumeric and half a teaspoon of ground ginger (or a 2cm peice of fresh root ginger squeazed through a garlic press).
• Fry the lot in a pan with a little butter and chopped onion and diced capsicum. Use enough to double the quantity.
• Spread on base and cover with a thin slice of mild cheese.
• Grill until the cheese is molten.

Bacon Prunes and Worcestershire - this one is not cheap but is a taste sensation.

• Dice up some bacon and fry in a pan with a little butter, so it is not crispy - but cooked
• Chop up a cup of pitted prunes and add to the bacon as it cooks
• Add some Lea & Perrins Worcestershire Sauce (it's expensive but it's not as diluted as the others so it goes further).
• Add fresh ground black pepper and a little wine so it is moist
• Spread on your base liberally and cover with a slice of cheese (not fetta)
• Grill until cheese is molten, cut and serve.

Vietnamese Fish topping - being ex-pat NewZealanders, we are pretty discerning when it comes to our fish. Sometimes the stuff we buy from the market is tasteless (probably old and been re-washed in fresh water). Here's the perfect solution for tastless (or mushy) fish. This one needs to be made Asian style - have everything ready to go before you start cooking. The thin slice of mild cheese is only to seal in the moisture and falvour during the grilling process so don't use a fetta cheese that will impart a sour flavour.

• Remove any skin and cut fish into cubes. Take out any bones.
• Fry diced ionions in butter in a pan until browned.
• Add cubed fish and stir
• Add approximately a desertspoon of chopped up fresh coriander leaves (don't be too fussy on measurements).
• Sprinkle a heaped teaspoon of flour over the fish and sautee it so the flour coats enerything in the pan.
• Add a teaspoon of asian fish sauce.
• Add a good sized glass of white wine and keep stirring so it makes a rich sauce.
• Add a large teaspoon of hony and immediately remove from the heat as you stir this in
• If too thick, add milk to thin the mixture.
• Spread on your base and cover with a thin slice of mild cheese.

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