Birthdays and Appetizers

I have some very dear friends that all have birthdays around each other. These people happen to also be colleagues of mine. Each year to celebrate we go to dinner, hold our monthly meetings over lunch, or something equally fabulous. This year we all met at another friend's house. We each brought part of dinner and a steak and chatted the late afternoon and evening away. 

It was fabulous to say the least. I was in charge of 2 appetizers and croutons for the salad. Here are some food pics and the recipes I used. Oh and according to my friends other people just throw out their day old French bread.... I'm telling you people, MAKE CROUTONS! They are so easy and just way too good not to. I promise. 

Anyway what I made: 

Roasted garlic and Brie and Tapenade. Now we've all read about my tapenade (oh you missed that post? Find it HERE), but the roasted garlic and brie was a new one for me. Let me tell you, it is my new staple appetizer! So easy- Here's whatca do:

Ingredients:

4 Heads for Garlic

Olive oil for drizzling. 

Directions: 

1 Preheat the oven to 400°F.

2 Peel away the outer layers of the garlic bulb skin, leaving the skins of the individual cloves on. It should be an scantily-clad garlic bulb, not a naked one. :) Using a knife, cut off 1/4 to a 1/2 inch of the top of cloves, exposing the individual cloves of garlic.

3 Place the garlic heads in a baking pan. I enjoy muffin pans when doing this, but I have also used just a regular old baking dish. Just make sure that the bulbs are cut side up and they can stay that way. Drizzle a couple teaspoons of olive oil over each head. Cover with aluminum foil. Bake at 400°F for 30-35 minutes. If the garlic tips over in the pan, all the great natural sugar will run out of the cut tops and burn on the bottom of the dish. Burned garlic is gag-alicious... spare yourself.  

Once the garlic has cooled you can serve it with French bread and Brie. Or you can pop the cloves out and mix them with butter and slap it on some Crusty Rustic Italian bread for the BEST garlic bread around. You can also just eat the garlic. No really... It is just that good. :)

CROUTONS: Sorry no pictures....

Ingredients:

8-10 ounce loaf of French bread (or any day old artisan bread. Note: the denser the bread the harder the croutons will be)

1 Tbs butter, melted

3 Tbs olive oil

2 tsp kosher salt

3/4 tsp cayenne pepper

1/2 tsp black pepper

2 tsp Italian herbs

Preheat oven 450.

In a large bowl mix the butter and olive oil together. add the bread cubes and toss to coat. Sprinkle with salt, peppers and herbs. Spread in a single layer on a baking sheet. 

Bake until golden (about 10 mins). Once cooled try not to eat them all at once. Really they should just go on salad or something. :)