It’s wild card weekend! Today marks the start of the NFL playoffs. Tomorrow, the Minnesota Vikings aka the NFC North Champions will be facing off against the Seattle Seahawks.
While I follow the Vikings and sort of pick up on other goings on in the NFL through being forced to set a Draft Kings line up each weekend by my husband (the fact that he only bets $1 on me each week should say something), what I love about football Sundays, the playoffs and ultimately the Super Bowl is an excuse to eat finger food, appetizers, dips, buffalo wings, and all sorts of other good snacks. Appetizers are just perfect for watching football. So every Saturday between now and Super Bowl Sunday, I’m going to post one of my favorite apps.
This weekend, I’m going to start with a bit of a wild card app – Fig and Apple Bruschetta. It’s not something you’ve probably seen on the tables at Super Bowl parties before but believe me it is awesome and is a nice, not too heavy alternative to the traditional football snacks. And don’t think it’s just for the ladies either – I got just as many compliments from men as women (if not more) last time I made it.
I first had this fig and apple bruschetta when my two favorite ladies in Phoenix took me out to dinner at this little pizzeria last time I was visiting. They made 6 different varieties of bruschetta and this was definitely my favorite. It starts with a crispy toasted baguette, creamy and rich mascarpone, almost honey-like sweet fig jam, and crisp apples. For a little salt to offset the sweet, I added a little prosciutto when I made it at home. It might be my most successful copy-cat recipe to date!
I took this to the holiday potluck at my Saturday night bowling league and received several compliments and one request for the recipe! Although I have to say it’s more about assembling than it is about a recipe.
Here’s what you need:
Not pictured: lemon, a critical player that will help prevent the apples from browning.
Start by slicing the bread about ½ inch thick.
Place bread on a foil lined baking sheet. Brush both sides lightly with olive oil.
Bake at 375 degrees for 10 minutes, flipping halfway through. This will make them lightly toasted, you can take them farther if you want. I would just recommend that you don’t get them so crisp that they are hard to bite into.
Remove toasted bread to a wire rack to cool and prep the other ingredients.
Start by slicing an apple into quarters. Remove the core. Cut 1/8-1/4 inch slices. Squeeze on some fresh lemon juice and toss to coat the apples. This will prevent browning.
If you want to use prosciutto – which I would highly recommend. Slice it into about 1-1/2 inch wide strips.
Now it’s time to assemble. I made a double batch of this, using two loaves of baguette for my bowling league and made half with prosciutto and half without.
If using prosciutto place a little bit of mascarpone onto a baguette. This will help glue the prosciutto onto the bread. Then add a thicker layer of mascarpone, I’d say between ½ and 1 tablespoon. Follow that with a thing spread of fig jam, about a ½ teaspoon. Top with an apple slice.
The amounts of toppings are all approximate. Feel free to adjust to your personal tastes.
Dig in and enjoy!
If you aren’t going to eat right way, they will keep in the fridge for a few hours. I would recommend making them as close to serving as you can so the bread doesn’t get too soft with the mascarpone spread onto it.
- 1 baguette, sliced into ½ inch slices
- Olive oil
- 8 oz mascarpone cheese
- 1 honey crisp apple
- lemon
- 4 oz fig jam
- 3 oz prosciutto, sliced into 1-1/2 in strips (optional but highly recommended)
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil.
- Brush both slides of each slice of bread lightly with olive oil. Bake for 10 minutes, flipping once. Cool.
- Quarter the apples and then remove the core. Slice into ⅛-1/4 inch slices. Toss with a squeeze of fresh lemon juice to prevent browning.
- If using prosciutto, start with a really thin layer of mascarpone cheese on the baguette. Top with prosciutto. Top with more mascarpone, about ½-1 tablespoon. Spread with a ½ teaspoon or so of fig jam. Top with an apple slice.
- Serve.
[…] We spent Christmas last year in the cities – only the second Christmas in our lifes (that I am aware of) that we didn’t spend in Ely. The other one was in Michigan when I was pretty young when my grandparents still lived there. Dad had surgery last year in mid-December and wasn’t allowed to go back to rural Minnesota until after Christmas – so we hosted Christmas at our house. Some googling gave us the idea for a figgy old fashioned, it sounded fun and Christmasy and I almost always have fig jam around since it is amazing on appetizers – like these Fig and Apple Bruschetta. […]