Do you like olives? And I don't mean those black Mission olives that come in a can. I mean, real olives. Months and months ago, one of our grocery stores here (Meijer Foods) got an Olive bar. It isn't anything too fancy, just a small selection of oil cured kalamatas, some manzanillas and picholines. A few times we've bought some of them to snack on, but recently I found out an even better purpose...Well, if you do like Olives, read on..
Do you like Bruschetta? We've consumed an impossible amount of different variations this summer, especially with the large excess of tomatoes and basil we had in our garden... Anyways, the newest variation involves an olive spread called Tapenade. I recently saw an episode of Good Eats involving Olives and one of the featured recipes was a variation of Tapenade. Apparently in the Mediterranean, Tapenade is very popular. Along with the tomato mixture, tapenade would make a simple but great appetizer. So I whipped up a batch of Tapenade and it was great. Neither Anna or I could get enough of it. So I thought maybe I should share it... (I'll have to share the short and sweet tomato mixture recipe soon)
The original recipe is here, I altered it just a little bit by omitting the anchovies and instead substituting a dash of kosher salt. The best bread I have found for bruschetta is a baguette. After you've mixxed your tapenade, and you're waiting for it to integrate (You were going to let it integrate right!? Any raw salad or spread, especially one that contains an acidic element, in my mind definitely benefits from a period of integration, so.. let it rest, go make your bread), take a baguette and slice it on a bias so that your pieces are very wide, but still very thin. Then, preheat your oven to 350 or so and lay out all of your slices of bread on a cookie sheet. Then, take some light olive oil and spread just enough to moisten the top of each slice. (Usually for the tomato bruschetta I mix a small amount of garlic salt with the oil, but in the case of tapenade, it is already quite salty enough!) After all of your bread has been oiled, place it in the oven and let it bake for a bit. The idea being that the olive oil is going to help it brown and along with the heat, its going to get very crunchy. This is really nice for spreads and such (like tapenade or tomatoes!). If you find the bread taking too long, or maybe your wife has asked one too many times how much longer it will take, you can use the broiler in the oven to get the bread done alot faster. Anyways, after all of your bread has taken on a nice golden brown color, take it out, let it cool a few minutes, and serve it along side the tapenade, allowing everyone to spread it on to their own choosing.
Anyways, hope you all have a chance to enjoy it sometime. It goes really well with a healthy glass of dark, dry red wine and a warm summer or fall afternoon.