Hey guys! You might know I live for light and casual dinners I can whip up in minutes from the ingredients I have at home, without cooking and all the mess that entails. I have some faves but obviously, the same sandwich, however great, can get boring after a while. So, ever since I was a teen, I’ve been figuring out different ways to combine bread, cheese, veggies, fruits, spices and cold cuts. I do very little cooking nowadays but I have a lot of tried and tested ‘recipes’. And I still get a kick out of trying something new, and finding something brilliant. If you’re like me, you know that’s total gourmet heaven.
Now, I’m no food blogger but I just looove to eat. So far I have posted my choc overload muffin recipe on the blog and a few of my gourmet snippets on my Insta. I guess they clearly show some of that passion 🙂 You can check them out if you like: the cream goat cheese delight, my perfect croissant breakfasts here and here, a really cool veggie sandwich, my fave natural fruit teas here and here, some salami and goldberry baguette bites, and some great snacks fit for a dinner party.
How do you know you’re a casual gourmet?
You…
- Enjoy casual evenings at home.
- Usually prefer to grab a quick bite before heading out.
- Prefer quality to quantity.
- Enjoy interesting, sometimes unusual flavour combos.
- Don’t really find the time for cooking.
- Seek energy and enjoyment in your meals – you don’t want them to weigh you down.
- Love to eat well and want your easy meal to look and taste like they were prepped by a pro chef, even if it’s just a sandwich.
Sound familiar?
Today’s amazing gourmet bite
So, what are we having tonight for dinner? This is my latest cool combo that does not require cooking (only a bit of grilling). Still, it gives you the impression you are having a proper – albeit light – gourmet dinner. To big eaters, this would be an appetizer. After all, it’s just a minimal grilled cheese sandwich, served with strawberry hearts and avocado slices tumbled in basic salad ingredients. It’s easy, tasty, light but filling – perfect for a quick but proper bite. And how can we prepare it in a blink of an eye? Here’s how.
Ingredients
- One ripe avocado.
- A few slices of bread. Use the amount you would normally have for a sandwich lunch, or a little less as the avocado is quite filling. Here I used soft bread with a salty golden-baked crust. I’m sure breads like ciabatta or plain toast squares would work nicely too.
- A few slices of cheese to fully cover the bread. For this I always use the tasty and mature Emmenthal type cheese. The thinner the slices, the better the cheese is when grilled.
- A couple of mid-sized or large strawberries.
- 1 teaspoon of extra virgin olive oil.
- 1 tablespoon of lime (or lemon) juice.
- Freshly ground mixed peppers (black, white, green, white and rose peppers)
Preparation
- Peel the avocado and slice it. Cut the full slices in half to get rustic strips. Put them in a small bowl.
- Pour some fresh lime juice on the avocado slices, making sure it gets everywhere. Lime adds a great flavour, and it also prevents the avocado flesh from going brown.
- Drip the olive oil onto the avocado slices and stir lightly.
- Finally, grind a good amount of fresh mixed peppers on the avocado and stir again.
- Leave the avocado ‘salad’ to settle at room temperature while you prepare the bread.
- Wash the strawberries in cold water and slice them up into little heart shapes. Place them on the plate on which you’ll serve the bread.
- Lightly grill one side of the slices of bread. Avoid drying them out, it’s enough to make the surface a little crispy (I do it in the microwave in 1 min and 50 secs)
- Put the cheese on the non-crispy sides of the bread slices. Grill them until the cheese starts to melt. With my microwave grill it takes 3 minutes. Grind some extra mixed peppers over the cheese before serving.
Tips
As there is no meat in this one, these four slices of bread will serve 1, but the avocado tumble can be shared to serve 2.
For serving, you can choose to add the strawberry hearts to the avocado so you get a real salad 🙂
Enjoy!
Do you have any foolproof meals that look and feel like they were prepared by a real pro? Feel free to share them – I’m always on the lookout for new ideas!
Cheers,
Gabriella
black square plate and bowl, cotton canvas mat, antique finish pine table and chair: Ikea Dinera collection
