A tomato to open the year since a tomato closed the last one. This time an heirloom as they’ve had an extended peak and give us permission to do nothing more than slice and salt. The reason to seek them out is soft skin and gentle sweetness and this toast is like the seasoning – simple, accentuating umami, but more elaborate than salt.
The first round was with an oxheart and a childhood delicacy in mind: anchovy toast with thinly sliced tomato, salt, and white pepper. But as is the nature of life, nothing is static, so what started as a low-commitment comeback of tomato on toast, turned into salad when whisking aioli and thinking of a chicken Caesar.
We’d ordered a round of heirlooms, and as soon as the juices of a hefty Striped German spilled onto the cutting board they were channelled into a measuring jug, so no part of it went to waste. Those juices were then tipped into aioli to make a creamy dressing for the remaining tomato, a sliced Ananas Noire, same concept but sans toast.
It’s such a simple idea for an extra dimension and giving dressing a ‘flavour’ and it started as a way of bringing roast chicken up to speed with summer: adding the roasting juices to aioli to dress the peppery leaves sitting under sliced white meat and crisp skin.
Life has pulled us away from the kitchen of late and we’re gently finding our way back, by crushing a garlic clove to make vinaigrette or whisking oil into an egg yolk to make mayonnaise. We’ve defaulted to these tomatoes a lot. And sometimes, if the spirit isn’t quite willing, toast is enough.
Tomato toast
First slice an heirloom tomato, saving every bit of the juice.
Then peel and thinly slice one shallot, soak in cold water for around 20 minutes, drain, and blot dry on a double layer of paper towel.
At the same time soak two tablespoons of salted capers in water, drain, and blot dry. Or if using capers in brine, rinse and drain.
The aioli is essentially mayonnaise seasoned with pulped garlic and, in this case, anchovy. It also takes extra-virgin olive oil, which means taking it slow is all the more important and administering the oil with the tines of a fork works really well. Take a look at the method here.
Peel and roughly chop two cloves of garlic and pound in a mortar and pestle with sea salt flakes until smooth. Add two to three anchovies from a jar, depending on their size and your taste and pound until it has all combined into a smooth paste.
Start it off by adding one egg yolk to a bowl with around a teaspoon of the tomato juices and about a third of the garlic-anchovy paste and whisk well (it’s easier to add more later than come back from adding too much at the outset.) Whisking constantly, slowly but surely add 180ml extra-virgin olive oil. The trick is to add the oil at a snail’s pace, only adding more drops of oil once the last drops have been incorporated. (For more detail, refer back to the mayonnaise method)
Once it has come together season with the garlic-anchovy paste according to your taste and the tomato juices according to how much you have and what thickness is required i.e. is it headed for salad or spreading on toast.
Make the grill-pan toast (see below).
Spread the toast with garlicky-anchovy mayonnaise. Cover with a single layer of tomato slices and season with sea salt flakes and freshly ground pepper. Add some shallot wafers and capers. (How heavy or light the smear and generous or sparse the toppings depends on personal taste.) Cut into quarters and serve immediately.
Grill-pan toast
Cut two 2cm slices from a one- to two-day old wheat sourdough loaf. Make the slices nice and thick because a pan will be placed on top, compressing them slightly.
Heat a cast-iron grill pan on a stove plate or gas burner that matches the size of the pan (we use our second-largest burner). The heat should be around medium high. If it’s too high it will blacken too quickly. The edge will darken a little quicker, but you don’t want to feel like the browning is at a sprint and you can’t keep up. Find the sweet-spot with your heat source.
While the pan is heating, place the slices of bread on a board and brush with extra-virgin olive oil.
As soon as you see smoke coming off the pan, arrange the slices with their oiled sides down in the centre of the pan. Place another pan on top (we use a round iron pan) to apply a bit of pressure – this just makes doubly sure the bread is touching the ridges. Check after about a minute and if it’s nearing the browning you’d like, immediately remove the second pan and brush the upward-facing sides of the bread slices with more oil. Remember, you want to allow for the browning that’s going to happen while you’re brushing.
Turn the slices and allow to cook for another minute. Once the second side is browned to your liking, remove from the pan and serve as soon as possible.