Hi there!
My Sunday morning has definitely started off on the right foot: I awoke to a message from my best friend saying that her and another girlfriend of mine are coming to visit me next month (YAY!), decided to have a living room yoga/stretching session in my PJs while my hubby and puppy still snoozed, and then I made a nice green monster smoothie to get my veggies & fruit in. Now I’m sitting here blogging to you in quite a fabulous mood. 🙂
This weekend has been a nice low-key one for me thus far. That should continue throughout today, as my only Sunday plans are cleaning and errands, exercising crazy Harley girl, and perhaps a mountain biking trip with Adam (I know I know, I was just talking about my foot injury in the last post – but I’m feeling out what workouts I can and cannot do, and will see how my foot feels during and after biking) and reading by the pool. I kicked off my weekend on Friday evening with an appetizer-style dinner eaten with Adam on our patio with a cool breeze drifting through.
Sometimes I just love making a few appetizers as my main meal. I guess I’m like a little kid in that I love noshing on some finger food. The idea to have an app-dinner night started while nabbing some groceries at Trader Joe’s and passing their fresh bread section.
Yum, I could eat a whole loaf myself, all on its own. But how could I do that when I had just picked up tons of gorgeous produce?
So instead, I decided to keep it simple: slicing the baguette, brushing it with EVOO, baking it until lightly crispy, then spreading creamy goat cheese on top. After tossing arugula and cherry tomatoes with sea salt and EVOO, I topped the crostini with the veggie mixture and voila, my delicious appetizer was ready!
I also whipped up some hummus, which I spread onto red endive to make lettuce cups, and served with pita bread as well.
Arugula Goat Cheese Crostini
Ingredients
- 6 oz baguette I used a half-baked rustic baguette from Trader Joe's
- 1 1/2 TSBP extra virgin olive oil
- 1/2 cup cherry tomatoes
- 2 cups arugula
- 2 oz creamy goat cheese
- 1/4 TSP sea salt plus more for sprinkling
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
- Cut the baguette into 15 thin slices. Brush both sides of each slice with 1 TBSP of olive oil, place on a baking sheet, and bake in the oven until lightly browned (around 10 minutes).
- Meanwhile, quarter the cherry tomatoes. Throw into a bowl with the arugula, sprinkle with 1/4 TSP sea salt and drizzle with remaining 1/2 TBSP olive oil.
- Once bread has gotten toasty, remove from oven and allow it to slightly cool.
- Spread goat cheese evenly on one side of each slice. Top each with arugula/tomato mixture, and sprinkle with additional sea salt if desired.
Nutrition
If I’ve put you in a crostini-making kind of mood and you’re looking for more recipe ideas, I wrote a post awhile back about crostini combos here.
Hope that you enjoy the rest of your day!
Oh wow! Your food looks amazing! I think appetizers are always the best! I don’t know why but they seem to pack more flavor.
Thank you! I know right? There’s just something about appetizers that’s so fun.