Hay Hay It’s Donna Day #4

Now I won´t deny that I´m quite fascinated by the Donna Hay look. And by all the very talented people out there, who not only do the stuff but actually photograph it , and make it look just as good. Amazing.
I have a fair few of Donna´s books, and I love looking at them, but more in the spirit in which I read Vogue. I wouldn´t take Vogue into a changing room, and I don´t normally cook from Donna´s books.
It´s the gorgeousness, see. All that pristine whiteness, with the perfectly balanced colours, with just a tiny splash of sauce on the rim, to show the humanity.
But I do love them, and if there was a way to buy the magazine in this country, I´d have a stack.
Since the theme for the  Hay Hay it´s Donna Day #4, hosted by Bron Marshall, is bruschetta, and not some glorious baked good, beautifully iced and spiced, I´ve decided to give it a go.

Here in Spain the bruschetta, as toasted bread with a savoury topping, was always referred to as a tostada. Then at some point in the 80´s it acquired the more pretentious monicker "tosta", which slightly annoys me. Now places that want to sound honest-to-goodness call them "panes". Tostada is only breakfast toast now.

I don´t often make a whole baguette and serve it to a multitude. My bruschetta antics are more of the dinner for two or three variety, served with a salad and a bowl of soup.

My favourite ingredient for a tosta or bruschetta is  onion jam. Smeared on the bread,it will transform and elevate the lowliest leftover piece of beef, lonely roast tomato, or dried up bit of cheese.

The perfect quick lunch is a goat´s cheese and onion jam bruschetta.
You toast a slice bread, of a country loaf type, drizzle some olive oil, and spread some of the jam.
Two slices of goat´s cheese go on top, and are sprinkled with black pepper.
A quick flash under the grill and you have something crusty, golden, sweet-sour and totally marvelous whatever the season.

The other, Tosta de Piquillos y Ventresca, is a store cupboard standby.
This time the bread is rubbed with garlic, drizzled with a very little oil, and then piled with slippery smoky almost sweet piquillo peppers from a jar. On top go a few slivers of ventresca, that tuna conserve made from the fatty underbelly. The merest splash of balsamic vinegar, and you´re in business.
You can use any normal good canned tuna, of course, but ventresca is le dernier cri for this sort of mixture right now.