food comas

Terroir Tribeca happens to be not only one of my favorite neighborhood spots, but probably my favorite wine bar in the city. What makes it even better is that besides the selection of wines, the selection and quality of food is phenomenal. I love the cheese and charcuterie platters, the meatballs, and of course the bruschettas. One of my favorite dishes at Terroir is the Tomato Basil Egg Bruschetta. It is simple and the ingredients are so basil but the way Marco Sanora puts them together is melt-in-your-mouth fantastic. I’ve actually seen him talk about how he makes it on the Cooking Channel before and have been meaning to try it out myself, which I finally did for my Memorial Day Dinner.

Tomato Basil Egg Bruschetta (courtesy of Cooking Channel)
Yields: 4 large servings

Ingredients:

• 1 can whole, peeled tomatoes, drained
• 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
• 1 clove garlic, thinly sliced
• pinch red pepper flakes
• 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
• 2 tbsp fresh chopped basil (I love fresh basil, so I definitely used more)
• 4 large eggs, whites and yolks separated
• 4 slices country bread, toasted
• salt and pepper

Directions:

In a medium skillet, heat oil over medium-high heat. Add the garlic, red pepper flakes, and oregano and cook, stirring, until fragrant, about 1 minute. Raise heat to high; crush each tomato when adding to pan. So this actually can become very messy (by that I mean it did); I would suggest cutting up the whole tomatoes prior to this unless you like having a mess. Season with salt and pepper. Cook the tomatoes, breaking them up with a spoon, until thickened slightly, 2 to 3 minutes. Stir in the basil.

Lower the heat to medium; stir in 2 large egg whites (reserve the remaining egg whites for another use). Cook the egg whites, stirring, until set and the tomato sauce thickens, about 1 minute. I think I overdid it with the whites, so really use them sparingly. I lost  some of that bright red tomato color by adding too much egg white.

Remove the skillet from the heat. Using the back of a spoon, make 4 indentations in the sauce; place an egg yolk into each indentation. Draw the sauce in from edges of the pan around each yolk and cover the skillet. Set aside until the yolks are warmed through and beginning to set, about 3 minutes. To serve, spoon the sauce with a yolk onto a piece of toast. It’s definitely important to toast the bread (which I failed to do because I was busy cooking other dishes). So while the results were tasty, the bread was missing that toasty crunch.