These slow roasted, basil pesto, breakfast tomatoes are just so delicious. They are placed in a super hot oven and then left to cool down in there, until they are soft and juicy little things to enjoy with any cooked breakfast. I love them with avocados on toast, omelettes, eggs on toast or with any big cooked breakfast. They are done in about 45 minutes or as long as it takes your oven to cool right down. If you want to eat them there and then you can take them out whilst the oven is still luke-warm or you can leave them in until it’s fully cooled down and then pop them in the fridge, ready to re-heat whenever you want to eat them (you can even put them in before you go to bed so they are done in the morning).
INGREDIENTS
3 medium or large tomatoes
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon of basil pesto
1/4 teaspoon freshly cracked black pepper
1/4 teaspoon table salt or freshly cracked sea salt
Optional – 2 tablespoons of crumbled feta or 1 tablespoon of grated parmesan cheese
Note* These tomatoes don’t turn out so well if they are very small or really large, the small ones will just fall apart and super large ones won’t get that nice baked, shrivelly look. Medium to large tomatoes work best.
Note* I mix olive oil and the pesto together to do these because pesto is so thick that if I spread it on them alone it tends to brown too much in the oven.
Note* You can place as many as you like in your pan or dish, as long as they are in a single layer, you’ll just need to mix up some extra pesto and olive oil.
METHOD
Place a rack in the centre of the oven and turn it to it’s hottest temperature, around 260°C conventional oven on bake or 240 C fan-bake oven.
First cut the tomatoes in half through the core and then remove the core from each half.
Place some baking paper on the bottom of an oven proof dish.
Next mix the olive oil with the pesto and spoon it over the open, cut side of the tomatoes. Sprinkle (or grind) the salt over them and crack the black pepper over them. If using either of the cheeses, sprinkle them on top also.
Check that the oven is up to temperature and if not, wait until it is and then place them in the oven and turn the oven off…..yes, off. Leave them in there until the oven is nearly cold…..or until they have shrivelled a bit and are juicy looking 🙂
There you go, I hope you like these as much as I do. If you have it, a single basil leaf placed on top of each one just before serving looks really nice 🙂
Storage – Keep covered in the fridge for up to 3 days. To re-heat it’s best not to use the microwave as they fall apart (done it often!) so best done in an oven-proof dish in a moderate oven, 180°C conventional oven, on bake or 160°C on fan-bake, for 10 minutes.
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