A quick and delicious side dish…

At this time of year we start weaning ourselves fro the beautiful summer tomatoes and having discovered so many local tomatoes and growers I have certainly made my share of summer tomato dishes and sauces, but my all time favorites are Tomatoes Provencal, preferably Jacques’ or Julia’s recipe. Today rather than write the recipe I will send you off to watch Jacques’ short video that explains the process better than I can.

There are suitable tomatoes in the grocery store off season so try some Campari tomatoes or tomatoes on the vine amp up the crumb crust with additional seasonings like grated parmesan cheese and different flavorful crusty breads like the beautiful 5 grain Italian at Publix, my personal favorite and by all means incorporate the crust of this bread, so good.

Cheese is optional… A note about the cheese in the crumbs, I don’t recommend the shaved big box store cheese, obviously too chunky for the crumb crust of course, but whizzed in a processor there is something so off putting might just be the blend or the graininess. Loved it for a shortcut, but not so much anymore, a good quality freshly grated cheese is so much better.

Main ingredients: Whole tomatoes
*Optional Parmesan cheese or blended Parmigiana and Pecorino Romano cheeses, personally I don’t recommend the shaved cheese variety in so many big box stores.
Parsley-fresh of course
Garlic, minced or grated
Rustic bread, cubed or torn…please no box or canned crumbs for this dish
food processor bread etc.

Link to video: