Scamorza in baguette with tomato salad & pesto

Can you believe this? One day it snows (not too long ago, might I add, and definitely well into what we call spring around here), the next everybody's running around in tankini's in the sun's sweltering heat! Conveniently enough at a time when I am down with over 40C and could well do with a little fresh breeze coming in from outside, but alas, 'twas not to be!

Don't get me wrong here: I love the sun as much as the next person, but I am just slightly frustrated at having lost an entire weekend (a long bank holiday weekend, no less) of sunshine which might well turn out to have been our entire allocation of summer this year - believe me, it's happened before! - plus the last but one weekend before the move which was all meant to be about decluttering and moving things around as well as giving no-longer-needed things away. As a side note: have you ever heard of freecycle? Just discovered it and it's absolutely brilliant! Anything you no longer need (I am not talking about food scrappings, but unwanted furniture, appliances, books, clothes, you name it) you post on the message board and anyone interested emails you, you chose a "winner" and they collect it from your doorstep... how cool's that? Not only does it save you the trip to the dump, it can also serve somebody else. In the past week, I have freecycled a juicer, a breadmaker, a set of metal coasters, a bag full of baby toys, a massive terracotta planter I have been moving around empty for the past 7 years (that's 5 moves!), a merchant chest - all was gone in under 30 minutes and I didn't have to lift a finger! (Just as a word of warning: apparently you can NOT recycle yourself or any other members of the family. Not that I've tried: it's in their policies ;-))

But on to more important things! Unsurprisingly, with my house converted into a literal sick bay, there wasn't much shopping or cooking to be done, but we welcomed the sunshine to a lovely salad of vine-ripened tomatoes, dollops of home-made pesto and slices of baguette stuffed with scamorza cheese... can you think of anything else that calls out summer at you loud and clear more than this does? Except, maybe, icecream? Or mojito cheesecakes? But more on the latter in another post...

Scamorza in baguette with tomato salad & pesto
(serves 4 as a starter, pesto yields more to keep)

For the pesto:
100 g pine nuts
70 g parmesan
30 g percorino pepato (with peppercorns)
100 g basil leaves
100 g good-quality olive oil, not too pungent
2 small cloves garlic
pepper to taste
You will only need a few dollops on each plate, enjoy the rest with some spaghetti the next day. Keeps in the fridge for a few days, if not weeks.

10 plum tomatoes
¼ red onion
4 basil leaves
good drizzle of olive oil
fleur de sel to taste
a splatter of balsamico (optional)
4 thick slices of baguette
2 lumps of scamorza* (smoked mozzarella)
1 tsp of butter (for frying)

First, prepare the pesto:
Toast the pine nuts in a small skillet without any oil, until they're browning and fragrant. Remove from the pan, put in a food processor and immediately crush the two cloves of garlic onto the hot nuts... this will take the edge off a bit. Add the washed and dried basil leaves, cheeses and olive oil, process to a fine paste. Season to taste. (Keeps in the fridge for days, if not weeks, if stored in a glass jar or other air-tight container)

For the tomato salad, cut the tomatoes into 1 cm cubes, finely chop the red onion. Roll up the basil leaves, then cut off thin slices (= chiffonnade). The result should be ribbon-like thin strands of basil. Combine everything in a salad bowl and season to taste with the fleur de sel, oil and balsamico (optional).

Carefully hollow out the baguette slices, cut pieces off the scamorza in roughly the shape of the hollows you've created. Fit the cheese neatly inside the bread, careful not to break it.
Melt the butter in a non-stick pan, fry the bread slices gently until the bread is browning and the cheese warm, but not melting away in the pan.

Place the stuffed bread slices on top of some tomato salad and serve with some dollops of pesto and a good drizzle of balsamico, if you like.

* Find scamorza cheese at a good Italian delicatessen, in the UK Carluccio's sell them all over the country.

Comments

[Kit]

Sorry to hear you've been so sick and on a sunny bank holiday weekend too. It had better not be the only sun allocation for the summer - I'm planning on bringing some over with us in June!

Freecycle sounds great!

[Jeanne]

Oh wow - can we have that to snack on this weekend instead of cake?! Looks fantastic.

I have heard of Freecycle - just never had the opportunity to use it. When we had to chuck out our old sofa and wardrobe, we found a local charity called Homestore that collects clean used furniture from your house in East London for free, and redistributes it to low-income households. They are very efficient, if anybody else in the East needs to get rid of furniture! http://www.quakersocialaction.com/homestore.htm

[mel]

I really have to try this!!! it looks amazing!!!!!

[Scott at Realepicurean]

Fantastic. A great way to get all those summer flavours down in one small portion!

[Leigh]

what a nice recipe - great idea! genuinley have never seen anything like this before, and i'll be trying it out!

[Pesto Lover]

I love pesto! For more great pesto recipes, see http://iheartpesto.blogspot.com

[We Are Never Full]

what a gorgeous recipe. i love this type of cheese. i'm going to have to remember this one!

[Sophie]

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