Vegan Caprese Bruschetta

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Mar 7

Written By Madelyn Flores

Would you believe me if I said I hate raw tomatoes but I cannot get enough of this recipe? This is for all my tomato haters (like me)! I am the type of person who makes it my goal to find ways to eat produce I hate.. is that weird? Well in the midst of trying to figure out ways I can eat raw tomatoes and enjoy it... I found a hack that can help you too. This is something I do even when I am not making Bruschetta. Ready for it?

The hack is white wine vinegar or red wine vinegar

That’s it! Combining raw tomatoes with a splash of vinegar truly takes away that very specific taste that us tomato haters, hate. Classic bruschetta calls for olive oil as the marinade but we are taking a step further with olive oil + vinegar! It’s life changing and gives it so much more flavor. Lets dive into it!

Ingredients:

12” french or sourdough baguette cut into 1” slices
4 large fresh basil leaves
1 cup of tightly packed diced Roma tomatoes
1/2 cup of thinly diced red onion
1 tbs olive oil (+ additional drizzle for grilling)
2 tbs white modena (or white wine) vinegar
- modena vinegar is simply a blend of white wine vinegar and grape must (I buy mine at Trader Joe’s but white wine vinegar will do just fine).
1/4 tsp black pepper
Salt to taste
Balsamic glaze for topping
Vegan mozzarella of choice (feta tends to be cheaper- feel free to use feta instead if need be, you’ll still get the same delicious outcome).

Tips for this recipe:

If you don’t have white modena (or white wine) vinegar you can use red wine vinegar. We really just want that vinaigrette flavor.
You can add more or less basil depending on your taste.
For the cheese, my go-to is treeline cracked pepper treenut cheese. Although this is not identified on the label as mozzarella; it works and tastes the same. It comes in a circle shape and you can easily crumble it on top of you dish. I buy it at wholefoods!
If you don’t want to make bite sizes like I did, you can easily make longer pieces by cutting the loaf of bread sideways at an angle.
Roma tomato’s tend to be the best for this recipe simply because they have tougher exterior and don’t get super mushy; but, if your grocery store is all out.. feel free to grab any. Heck, you can even use cherry tomatoes by dicing them into tiny pieces.

Step 1: Dice the tomatoes and red onion into tiny bite size pieces. This is important to fit on-top of the small bread pieces.

From left to right: bright green, wet basil leaves thinly chopped. Diced juicy red tomatoes. Thinly chopped purple onion.

Step 2: Roughly chop the basil leaves and combine the tomatoes, onion and basil to a bowl.

Step 3: Add the white wine vinegar, olive oil (1tbs), black pepper and salt to taste. Mix and combine all the ingredients together. You can place this to the side or place it in the fridge to make it even more refreshing; while we prep the rest.

Step 4: Slice the baguette (or loaf of choice) into 1 inch pieces.

Sliced bread on a sizzling hot pan, drizzled with olive oil and charred for crisp.

Step 5: Drizzle additional olive oil to a pan on the stove. Before turning the heat on run the slices of bread against the oil in the pan, flip it and do the same to the back. If you need more, feel free to drizzle additional olive oil on top. How much olive oil you use, will likely dictate how crispy the bread gets but keep in mind that a little goes a long way.

Step 6: Turn the stove on, to medium low heat. Don’t leave the area as you do not want these to burn. Everyone’s stove top is different so just keep an eye on them and flip them once you reach the desired amount of crisp.