Toast is the game – but first we need the bread!
Toast! It’s a great leveller and there’s plenty of tasty gourmet toast combos here to get your teeth into. Most people just go for boring old “jam on toast” – but there’s so much more to the genre than that. I don’t advise using white bread though or the bread police will be round! Tasteless supermarket pap is the worst, but even proper “white” is totally lacking in nutrition & taste. Go for organic wholewheat versions if you can – or even make your own wholemeal sourdough. It really isn’t that difficult – and the recipe is at the end. Soudough done well, with some extra seeds, is massively more nutritious than shop bought.
Loadsa toast ideas here – you just need a few extra items
I’ll give some basic items to use – olive tapenade, yeast pate, vegan mayo, baby plum tomatoes, sliced gherkins, roasted artichokes peanut butter, hemp butter – but there’s loads more. Obviously not everything goes with everything else, but the right combination of 2, 3 or 4 things, can make all the difference.
To butter or not to butter – that is the question.
Some folk don’t “butter” their toast, but I always do, & often add some yeast extract for a bit of zing. Then it’s coming up with the taste layers, sometimes using mayo, or hot Aivar to hold it together. So it’s not a recipe as such, but I’ll put pictures with a list of toppings in order as a caption. This post is more about giving people ideas & encouraging them to be more adventurous – you know who you are…..
Getting the balance of flavours right – but with an appealing look.
Sometimes things just don’t look right, but generally as long as it tastes good, I’m in. Vegan camembert with black olive tapenade smeared on top is my latest – pic to follow. Another would be Aivar, finely sliced smoked tofu, a generous layer of vegan mayo, & sliced baby plum or vine tomatoes.
From the merely sublime ~ to the really outlandish!
Sometimes really weird things work if you’re in the mood. I like some Natex yeast extract to cut through, then peanut butter & thinly sliced pickled onions. Weird I know – but it’s good. Maybe try hemp butter with sliced gherkins which is another favourite. Most times with some freshly ground black pepper on last. No list of toasts would be complete without gorgeous nutritious hummus!
Why not give some of these ideas a try
So be bold & go where no toast has gone before. Give these tasty gourmet toast combos an outing! Sourdough bread & other recipes mentioned in the picture descriptions are listed at the bottom of the pictures!
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Vegan Boursin with green & black olives 
Vegan Boursin with green & black olives































vegan cheddar with apricot jam Yorkshire style


Natural Rise/Sourdough using a bread machine Riley
Ingredients
Method
- Add 50g of water to 50g of flour and mix – cover & leave in a warm place (24-26°C is ideal) for 24 hours – a folding proofing cabinet is ideal for this – Brod & Taylor make a good one:- see note at end of recipe for a link to a site selling them…..
- For 3 more days consecutively, add a further 50g of water and 50g of flour - mixing well each time.
- After the 4th day, you should have 400g of starter batter, which should be fairly active with a slightly sour smell and bubbles showing on the surface.
- This starter is then ready to use immediately – and although the first loaves will not be so well risen, with care and attention AND regular use, the starter will continue to improve with time and usage.
- When you want to make a loaf (for the first time only), put 100g of this mix in the freezer as your back-up policy – or you can give it away to someone else as a starter primer. Use the rest to get the bulk fermentation going.
- For the very first loaf, the batter will already be at room temperature and active so this step can be omitted. However as you'll be storing the starter in fridge for subsequent loaves it will need to be taken out an hour or so before you want to make your loaf - to get it to the ideal temperature of 27°C so that it is active and ready to go again.
- Take the 300g of starter dough out of the fridge (or taken from your initial starter) and transfer to a medium sized mixing bowl. Leave at room temp for an hour so it warms up and becomes active.
- Once it's warmed up, add in a further 445g of water and 445g of wholemeal bread flour, and mix until it's a smooth thick even batter. Leave to ferment for 2 hours at 27°C if in a warming cabinet, or around 3 hours if around 21°C. You can play around with timings, but it wants to be around double the size..
- When it's doubled in size approximately, give it a bit of a stir and then into a clean bowl weigh out 300g of the batter. Try to be pretty accurate in this. Cover this and place in the fridge - this will be the starter for your next loaf.
- Transfer the rest of the batter to the bread machine pan - you're aiming to have 870g of batter to transfer - you'll always leave some behind, but 870g should be easily achievable.
- So just to be uber clear, the batter that’s waiting in your fridge will always be 300g, because as soon as you take out the 870g of batter to make a loaf, you are parking 300g back in the fridge to wait until you want to bake again – when you want to bake again - that’s when you “wake it up” by removing it from the fridge. The batter stored in the fridge is always at 100% “Hydration” – which means the water content versus the flour is 100% and exactly equal.
- Once the 870g of batter is added to the bread maker pan, add in 40g of fat, and 165g of flour and 9g of salt. Adding the flour will reduce the hydration level to 78%.
- Set it to the 45minute pizza dough setting or the shortest dough only program for your particular machine, and the bread-maker will do all the hard work and transform it into a very soft dough - which would normally require wet hands to knead effectively and be generally quite tricky to handle – but you’re bread-maker is doing it for you!
- Set a timer for 15 minutes - that's all the kneading it needs due to the fermentation assisting with some of the processes carried out by the kneading. While that's kneading, grease a 2lb bread tin.
- During the mixing of the dough in the machine, it may need a little bit of help with a non-stick spatula to make sure all the flour etc is incorporated into the dough ball.
- When the dough program has run for 15 minutes – stop the machine and immediately remove the pan and upturn it over the bread tin. If you leave it in the machine for more than a few seconds, it tends to spread and stick - so do it quickly, and it will drop straight in without sticking.
- If kneading by hand put the entire dough into the tin and gently push down so you have a reasonably flat surface. Ditto if you’re using the bread maker.
- Leave to rise until the dough is double in size/near the top of your tin - usually between 2 and 3 hours depending on how active your starter is and how warm the location - 25-26°C is a good compromise, but 27°C is best. Don't exceed 27°C though as off flavours and develop.
- It’s important not to let the dough rise for too long – you can estimate a doubling in size for the dough, or use the 2-finger method. Press the top with 2 fingers – if it springs back immediately, it’s still not fully risen – if the indentations linger and slowly come back – it’s ready to go in the oven. If the indentation remains – it’s probably over risen so give it less time in future.
- When up to temperature, carefully place the bread tin in the oven – avoid banging it or moving it violently.
- Bake at 195°C fan oven on middle shelf for 38 minutes.
- Leave for a 10 minutes then turn out and leave to cool on a wire rack.
Notes
- Thanks to Richard Riley for the inspiration for this recipe. I'd almost given up on sourdough after my last lot went south...… but I'm totally back on board now thanks to Richard!
- Always use filtered or bottled water – the chlorine will impede or even prevent the natural yeasts from becoming active enough. Use good quality Dove’s Farm or similar wholegrain BREAD/strong flour, and make sure it is fresh – no more than 6months as an absolute max.
- This bread is nice just as bread, but can also be toasted. It will keep much longer than standard home-made yeasted bread as the natural ph. of the loaf tends to inhibit mould formation.
- Toast it on a lower setting than normal for a really nice finish – don’t over toast it.
- A brod and Taylor proofing oven as below is a useful tool, but is by no means essential. Natural Rise/sourdough doesn't require the same high temperature as yeasted bread - but it does help to keep times and results very consistent.
- A note about times. The longer the bread takes to rise, generally, the more of a sourdough taste it will have..-
- On water, you can increase the water content if you wish. It may take a little longer to rise and cook, but you can play around with that a bit to get exactly the results that you're looking for.
- Sour dough starter can be frozen for long term keeping if you're going away for instance, but it will definitely last at least a month from the last feed in a cool refrigerator.
- https://www.amazon.co.uk/Folding-Chocolate-Proofing-Fermenter-Multi-Cooker/dp/B01MQK1204/ref=pd_lpo_79_t_0/260-4067861-2030369?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=B01MQK1204&pd_rd_r=ca7be74e-9035-44f5-b729-0ab51ce26313&pd_rd_w=5N85O&pd_rd_wg=bT4Q6&pf_rd_p=7b8e3b03-1439-4489-abd4-4a138cf4eca6&pf_rd_r=67N9YV4CAEXWKG4Z1HQM&psc=1&refRID=67N9YV4CAEXWKG4Z1HQM
- It is also possible to do some extra autolysing - this has some benefits - particularly with yeasted bread, but also with sourdough. Link explaining this at the end.
- The link to information on autolysing.....:- https://www.kingarthurflour.com/blog/2017/09/29/using-the-autolyse-method#:~:text=An%20autolyse%20is%20the%20gentle,occur%20in%20your%20bread%20dough.
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Creamy Hummus
Ingredients
Method
- The order is important – it doesn’t turn out well if you do it in the wrong order.
- Weigh 70g of tahini directly into the food processor bowl – less mess that way.

- Squeeze the lemon juice until you have the 60ml – and pour into the processor bowl

- Blend the lemon juice and tahini for 60 secs (can do longer it’s not critical just needs to be well mixed).

- Add in 15g crushed garlic, 6g sea-salt, 35g olive oil and cumin if using.

- Blend for another 60 seconds scrape and blend for a further 60 seconds (or until very smooth). Again – can be longer.

- Add 250g of chick-peas, and blend for 5 minutes – if you use frozen chick peas, there's generally no need to scrape the sides etc as the frozen chickpeas do it. Check to see how well it's blended though.

- I love it extra smooth so I do it for even longer. However you don’t want it to get warm as this will alter the flavour. A trick here is to use the frozen chick-peas – so that the hummus doesn’t warm up in the blender! Use ear defenders though as it’s very noisy! Using ice cubes for the extra water content helps too.

- Towards the end, you can dribble in some chick-pea juice if you have it or just water until you get that creamy (but not runny) consistency. Bear in mind it will thicken up in the fridge if not used immediately, so to maintain the nice creamy texture you will need to mix in extra water/ice cubes
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Red Pepper Hummus
Ingredients
Equipment
Method
- You can make a douple lot of hummus as in the main recipe - and set one aside as plain or for caramelised onion hummus

- If you're making a double quantity of hummus, put one quantity of the plain hummus aside in a bowl and leave the rest in the blender.
- weigh out 100g of roasted red pepper and drain to avoid the hummus becoming too wet. I find if I don't then immediately freeze the other 200g of red peppers, then they jsut go off in the fridge - so freezing them is the smart move.

- Add the peppers to the one lot of hummus in the blender.

- Add the chilli paste, the ginger, and the paprika & soya sauce if using that.

- blend the red pepper in the food processor

- it will be slightly more sloppy than regular hummus, but will firm up in the fridge

- be careful when transferring as it will be more difficult to get into the bowl

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Vegan Tofu Mayo Sandwich Filling
Ingredients
Equipment
Method
- Chop the tofu into ½ cm sized- pieces.

- Heat in microwave on half power for about 10 minutes. This will cause a lot of water to come out of the tofu - especially when you drain it. It's best to do it in 2 to 3 minute lots and stir gently in between.
- Leave to drain in a colander to reduce the water, and for the tofu to cool down - it will be quickest in the fridge.
- Chop the red onion finely.
- Chop or cut the chives with scissors into fairly small pieces.
- When the tofu has cooled - put in a medium sized bowl.
- With the cooled tofu in a medium sized bowl, add in the chopped chives & finely diced red onion and mix briefly

- Add in the spices etc: mustard, turmeric, nutritional yeast, kala namak, diced onion, chopped chives, black pepper and vegan mayo and gently combine.

- You can use a fork or a spoon to stir it – you want to mix it and break the tofu pieces up a little, but not too much.
- It may work well with firm tofu – although I haven’t tried that yet - but definitely NOT extra firm.
- Use as a sandwich or roll filling: This was perfect for 6 of the small round pre-cut Kingsmill wholemeal rolls, with plenty left over for toast as it will keep for a few days.

- Or you can have it on toast with other things like vegan smoked ham......
- or avocado......
Notes
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Hollandaise Sauce & "tofu eggs" Florentine.
Ingredients
Method
- Make sure the cashews are well soaked or it will take ages to blend – unless you have a Nutribullet. But a Nutribillet is the best way to blend this supersmooth.
- Add all the ingredients into your food processor (or Nutribullet) and blend thoroughly so that it is completely smooth.

- Pour enough of the finished blended sauce into a heatproof bowl - pyrex is best. Allow 50g per person should should be enough.

- Meanwhile, take some blocks of tofu, and slice about ¼ inch/ 5mm thick - this is each block sliced into 4
- Put a layer of soy sauce, chilli sauce, etc, kala namak in a large pyrex baking dish. Pour soy sauce & chilli sauce on top. After 10 mins, turn over.

- Pan fry this on a griddle or similar, on a medium heat in olive oil for a few minutes either side.

- Sauté some crushed garlic, then add in spinach and soy sauce and wilt the spinach until nice and soft.

- Slice beefsteak tomatoes – Turkish ones are best. Oil a baking try, and brush the top of the tomatoes with oil. Sprinkle some oregano and BBQ or Cajun spice on top and grill 5 mins or so.

- Peel and thinly slice some nicely ripe avocado pear.

- An alternative to avocado or tomato is to slice & pan fry portobello mushrooms
- Heat the hollandaise sauce over a pan of hot water in a glass bowl or on low power in the microwave until warm, but don't let get too hot or it will thicken too much. I find the microwave on 30% for a few minutes at a time - then stirring - gives the most consistent results.

- Make some toast, butter it, and if you like it, spread some Marmite or Natex on one side.

- then carefully place the pan-fried tofu, to cover the slices of toast. I prefer my sourdough, which uses less tofu, but on a standard wholemeal loaf you will need the whole 600g pack.

- Spread a layer of spinach, on that if you like spinach

- Then place the tomato,

- finally place the thinly sliced avocado.

- Heat the stack in the microwave oven for around 30 secs to warm it all up nicely
- Then drizzle the warmed hollandaise sauce on top generously.....

- Finally sprinkle with smoked paprika and black pepper

Notes
- I'm testing if this can be frozen sucessfully.
- Quantity of sauce should be enough for a generous serving for 9 to 10 people - so either make less or freeze or use the rest in a different dish.
- Quantities of avocados, tofu, spinach & tomatoes are approximate and depend on individual preferences.
- I usually make a double lot and freeze what I don't use in 130g for 2, 200g for 3 & 260g for 4 lots so it's easy to defrost enough for how many slices you're making.
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Scrambled tofu on toast a la florentine
Ingredients
Equipment
Method
- In a half litre jug, add nutritional yeast, turmeric, cumin, paprika, , salt, and pepper and all the other spices.

- Add water and mix well - using the back of a wooden spoon to remove any lumps

- Cook off all the veg in the appropriate order in the Actifry or a wok - around 15 minutes for each batch – you can do peppers and courgettes together, and chuck the halved tomatoes in halfway. Onions & mushrooms work best in a wok…..

- While your doing this, crush around 7 or 8 cloves of garlic into a large pan with a little oil and sauté until browning nicely.

- Add in the washed spinach and sauté until nicely wilted – add in some black pepper and a sprinkle of soy sauce as you do.

- Drain the tofu, then use fingers to break up the tofu in a separate bowl – not too much though – just one squidge through the fingers - enough to resemble scrambled eggs.

- Transfer to a microwave safe bowl – I prefer pyrex….. and heat on half power for 5 minutes - drain and repeat. You want to get it up to around 80°C – each time tip into a colander to drain the water released and repeat if necessary. Don't overdo it though as you still want it to be soft, just not too wet. Around a maximum of 5 or 6 minutes twice seems to work well. If you overdo it, the tofu looses its softness.

- Tip into the pan with the cooked veggies and capers and pour seasoning over tofu & veg mix and combine well – but not vigorously – more gently turning it over - colouring as much of the tofu mix as possible.

- Toss in chives at this point and then continue to stir gently as necessary for another 1 to 2 minutes to heat them all through. You’re just aiming to get the tofu mix hot throughout (you’ve already heated the tofu in the microwave which helps with this bit). Cover and heat gently making sure it doesn’t stick or burn while doing the wholemeal toast.
- Put a bed of spinach on each slice of toast,

- Add a generous helping of the scrambled tofu mix on top. Add some sliced avocado if you fancy, then spread some chilli sauce on top if you like, and ground black pepper.

Notes
- This will served 5 very generously, or 6 comfortably.
- I've used an extra block of firm tofu and adjusted the veggies and spices to suit so now, it will make 1.3kg so a standard batch will be about 1.05kg.
- So that's a whole 600g of soft and 1 1/2 blocks of firm.
- so a generous portion is around 210g for a medium sized piece of toast. 180g is "adequate".
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