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So the plan was waffles for breakfast Sunday. All week, that had been the plan. But when I rolled over, completely hungered since I had just snacked my way through Saturday night, waffles didn’t seem like an immediate enough gratification. So in my head this is sort of what was going on — I’ll have yogurt with strawberries that will be healthy. No, egg in a nest, that will be filling. No, too much work, but now I want toast. Oh toast with nutella. Oh, what about toast with nutella and strawberries. And that, along with the smell of coffee, is what finally pulled me out of bed and sent me padding into the kitchen where upon the counter I spied the first heirloom tomatoes of the season that I picked up at the market Saturday and a particularly lovely, soft, long roll, and then it clicked — heirloom tomato toasts.
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This is a combo of two things: My very favorite summer sandwich — white bread with thick salted slices of juicy ripe tomato, lashings of mayo, eaten over the sink to catch the drips. And the seasonal toasts that chef Dan Kluger always features on his menu at the market-to-table ABC Kitchen — great bread, kissed with olive oil then grilled until crisp, slicked with aioli or ricotta and then topped with vegetables. Or crab, the crab toast is particularly good. It sounds so simple, and it sort of is, but it’s a crazy inspired and perfect way to highlight perfectly in season produce.
I sliced the roll lengthwise and popped it into the toaster oven to get golden. While it was toasting, I mixed a teaspoon of mayonnaise with a teaspoon of super finely grated Parmesan. When the toast was done, I ran a peeled garlic clove over the top of the bread and added a very thin layer of the mayo/Parmesan mixture, then topped with slices of yellow Brandywine tomato. A judicious sprinkle of big flaked pink salt and a scattering of finely chopped Delfino cilantro went on top. Then I sliced the rolls into bite-sized pieces — it was like having breakfast canapés.
