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Confit garlic with roasted tomatoes on toast

Name: Confit garlic with roasted tomatoes on toast
Total time: 1 h 15 min
Ingredients: garlic 4 whole bulbs; thyme 6 sprigs; olive oil 400ml; cherry tomatoes 300g, halved; sourdough 4 slices, toasted

1 hour 15 minutes + resting
serves 4
Easy

Mornings in Spain often start with 'pan con tomate' (toast slathered with tomato and garlic purée). Use British tomatoes in this deconstructed version.

By Adam Bush

Published: August 24, 2019 at 9:35 am

Make this pan con tomato recipe, then try more tomato recipes, such as our tomato soup and tomato pasta.

This simple toast is a gut-friendly powerhouse. Tomatoes offer antioxidants such as lycopene and plant polyphenols, whilst garlic and thyme are natural antimicrobials to keep gut bacteria in balance. Plus, olive oil is rich in fatty acids and polyphenols, proven to reduce inflammation in the gut. Try more recipes for a healthy gut.

Don’t use extra-virgin oil for this recipe as the flavour will be overpowered. Regular olive oil is fine.

Ingredients

garlic 4 whole bulbs
thyme 6 sprigs
olive oil 400ml
cherry tomatoes 300g, halved
sourdough 4 slices, toasted

Method

Step 1

Heat the oven to 160C/fan 140C/gas 3. Cut the garlic bulbs horizontally across the tops, so that all of the cloves are revealed, and sit them snugly into a small, deep roasting tin. Add the thyme sprigs and a generous pinch of salt, and pour over the oil until the bulbs are nearly submerged, adding a little more if needed. Cook for an hour or until the cloves are really soft.
Step 2

Put the cherry tomatoes cut-side up into a roasting tin and sprinkle with salt. Put into the oven for the final 25 minutes of the garlic’s cooking time.
Step 3

Use a spatula to lift the garlic bulbs from the oil and cool slightly. Squeeze the cloves from their skins onto the toasted sourdough and pile on the tomatoes, along with a little of the garlic-perfumed oil (keep the rest for cooking – it will keep for two weeks in the fridge).