Tonight's Dinner: September 7, 2014

We are officially in intestinal recovery mode.  I hit up Costco early on in the day before any jet lag could really kick in and left the store looking like a vegetarian save for Emmy's organic chicken.  I told Nick that we would be eating like rabbits for the next week.  Tonight kicked off that trend.  Inspired by the delicious food from Spain, I wanted to try out making simple tomato bread before diving into anything really complicated right off the bat.   Something we noticed is that a lot of the Spanish dishes that we really enjoyed were not overly complicated.  Of course, there were some that were very technically in depth, but a lot of the flavors were bold and not jumbled as sometimes happens when I start throwing things at random into a pot.  Their flavors are very fresh and deliberate.

I love Costco's focaccia bread so I used that instead of baguettes.  Baguettes really make a difference, but with only two people, we wouldn't be able to finish a whole baguette before it went stale.  I blended up a few plum tomatoes, garlic, EVOO, and salt in my Vitamix to make a chunky tomato juice that I could easily spread over the bread.  It turned out pretty well.  I just wish I had gone to get some anchovies and green olives.

For the salad I simply boiled the corn, no salt or butter added, and cut it off the cob for a topper.  I also opened a large can of tuna (in water) to split between the two of us and used the excess tomato sauce I made for Spanish-style tomato bread as a dressing.  I liked this as a dressing because it's low in fat, but added a subtle richness to the salad.  I got avocados from Costco, but they weren't nearly ripe enough to eat.  I tried cutting one up, but it was so hard that I when I tried biting into a piece it left teeth marks like a piece of foam.  I never knew that avocado was that dense when not ripe.  Live and learn.

Spanish-style tomato sauce 

3 ripe plum tomatoes
2 cloves garlic
1 tbsp good EVOO
1 tsp kosher salt 

Directions:
Blend in a mixer or food processor until chunky. 

I brushed on the tomato juice and then stuck the bread under the broiler for a few minutes.  Once the bread came out, we drizzled a little more EVOO over the top.