My recipe for avocado toast with herbs is creamy, crunchy, green with fresh herbs and absolutely addicting. Before developing this recipe, I thought that avocado toast was a rather plain breakfast or lunch dish for times when you had ripe avocados and no inspiration.
My recipe for avocado toast with herbs lets you rob your herb garden on the porch or kitchen window sill and infuse olive oil with the fresh herbs. Infused oil is brushed on store bought white or wheat bread (just the plain sandwich bread from the store). The bread is just a vehicle for everything else and doesn’t need to be anything special. Special ingredients will come, but the bread pretty much just allows you to pick up the finished yummy goodness. This is a good thing, because I still haven’t found very good gluten free bread. I used Schar gluten free white bread because it is the best that I have found. It is pretty good—however, you can still taste that the bread is gluten free (this is not a good thing).
I discovered the wonder of great avocado toast while on vacation in the Hudson River Valley. We stayed at a wonderful farm bed and breakfast called Thyme in the Country. The host served avocado toast for breakfast and it was an incredible taste journey. She infused olive oil with fresh organic garlic from her garden, brushed it on bread, added mashed avocado with fresh herbs and topped with kitchen-grown sprouts.
Back at home, my craving for avocado toast led me to experiment around and come up with a unique flavor profile that is an explosion of flavor on a plate.
Planning for Perfect Toppings
Sprouts
It requires planning to create the perfect toppings for best avocado toast with herbs. I grow my own sprouts on my kitchen cabinet. I bought my sprout jar lid and seeds as a souvenier of the Hudson Valley trip at an organic market. You can buy the sprout jar lid and seed kit at Organic Markets, Whole Foods and on Amazon. You will need to also get a glass mason jar with the same jar mouth opening as the sprout jar lid. Mason type jars are common and inexpensive at your local Walmart, Hobby Lobby, Michaels or Dollar Tree store.
It takes me 3-4 days to grow sprouts and to green them up in a window sill in my kitchen. If you are short on time, you can pick up alfalfa sprouts at your local grocer. San Angelo, where I live, doesn’t run to sprouts and I am afraid of salmenilla that is often found in produce section sprouts. I usually pick up super hard avocados and about the time that they are ripe, the sprouts are ready too.
Herbs
I grow several types of basil, oregano, two types of thyme and chives used in this recipe. Try Sweet Basil, Lemon Basil, a small sprig of Oregano, Lemon Thyme and English Thyme for the oil. I also gather chives as a topping for the toast. If you have chive flowers, you can separate the flowers and also sprinkle on top. Chive flowers add a lovely color but be careful not to overwhelm the toast with oniony chive flavor. A little bit of chives go a long way.
If you don’t have a full blown herb garden like me, just limit your flavor profile to fresh Sweet Basil from the produce aisle at the grocery store. I have never tried using dried herbs to make the herb oil. If you do opt for dried herbs, make sure that you only add one or two. It is very easy to make the oil taste ‘muddy’ if you mix and match dried herbs indiscriminately.
Best Avocado Toast With Herbs
Equipment
- Sprout jar and seeds
- mini food processor or mini blender
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup mixed fresh herbs sweet basil, lemon basil, thyme, oregano
- 1/4 cup olive oil extra virgin
- 2 large Avocados very firm if you are waiting for sprouts to grow
- 1 medium fresh lemon
- 4 pieces white, wheat or gluten free bread ordinary store bread works great
- 2 tbsp chopped fresh chives optional
- 1 cup alfalfa sprouts or sprouts of choice optional
- 3 tbsp toasted walnuts chopped
- 1 tsp fleur de sel flakey sea salt optional
Instructions
Herb Infused Oil
- Remove stems from herbs and chop large leaves coarsely
- Finely chop herbs in food processor
- Drizzle in olive oil
- Let stand 15 minutes while you prepare the avocado and toast
Prepare the Toast
- Brush each slice of bread one one side with the herb infused oil. You can allow a few pieces of herb to transfer to the bread but be careful to primarily use oil as too many herbs will yield bitter toast.
- Broil the toast under the oven broiler or in a toaster oven until golden brown and a bit crispy
Prepare the Avocado Spread
- Peel and dice the avocado
- Mash diced avocado until almost smooth
- Zest the entire lemon
- Juice the lemon
- In a small bowl mix mashed avocado with lemon zest
- Add up to 1 tbsp of the herb infused oil to the avocado mixture. This insures a creamy spread and connects the flavor profile from the bread to the avocado
- Add lemon juice 1 tbsp at a time to the avocado mixture to taste. I like the mixture to lemony so I usually add all the juice. The lemon zest already adds a lot of lemon flavor so you may want to go light on the lemon juice
- Add salt and pepper to taste to the avocado mixture. I use white pepper and I don't use very much. The emphasis should be on the lemon and herbs rather than the pepper
Assemble the Avocado Toast
- Divide the avocado spread evenly between the toast
- Top with sprouts, sprinkle with chives and walnuts
- Finish with Fleur de sel salt or other flakey sea salt
Good writing., but sounds kind of yucky to me. Everybody to their own thing, just give me bisquits and gravy or ham and eggs. Ha!Ha. You go girls. db