I’ve clearly been assimilated into Portuguese culture: I’m posting pictures of my homemade soup with mini-tostas. I can see my past non-soup-making self mocking my current varinha mágica*-wielding self, while my current soup-making self wonders why it took so long to discover the immersion blender.
Anyway, about mini-tostas… (Since the Portuguese make a practice of creating diminutives for all nouns, wouldn’t these be called tostinhas?)
Before mini-tostas entered my culinary world, I used to be pro-crouton, especially in caesar salads. But I stopped buying croutons years ago — I find them overpriced and many store varieties are too hard. Croutons are easy to make, but in a small household the oversupply turns them into little rocks before long. Oyster crackers lack flavour and regular crackers are too dry and floury. Hello, First World Problem #2,075. I’m turning into a bread snob!
Behold, the mini-tosta. A 350g bag of mini-tostas costs roughly the same as a 100g bag of croutons (about €1.50). They are super versatile — use in soups, hummus and other dips, put on some jam or marmelada, melt some cheese over it, go crazy with the bruschetta. They last longer than bread, they’re lighter than croutons, crispy but they won’t scrape the roof off the mouth, and sold in different sizes (the minis are the smallest; no-one’s made micro-tostas yet). Now that I’m geeking out on a very obscure subject, I ought to tell you that it doesn’t matter which brand you buy… I have it on good authority that all the mini-tostas in the country are made in the same factory in Aveiro. I have eaten bags and bags of mini-tostas in my time here, and not encountered a dud yet. Now that’s consistency!
So much bread talk. Are you hungry? Come over to my house this winter, I’ll make you soup to go with your mini-tostas.
* Magic wand. Isn’t varinha mágica a great name for a band? Oh wait, there is a band with a song…
September 25, 2015
Album: Portugal [Autumn 2015]
Possibly related posts:
- It’s Not A Green Thumb I Need, It’s Culinary Skill It occurred to me today, after walking from my house to my in-laws’ for lunch, that a green thumb isn’t that necessary in Portugal after all. Food grows abundantly here...
- Just Another Day In Confusion-Land This is peru, not to be confused with Peru the country. Peru is turkey, not to be confused with Turkey the country. Confusos? Confusas? Let’s just eat....
- What’s For Lunch, Porto? When Paulo and I had lunch in Porto last Saturday, I took a picture of this sign to give blog readers an idea of what the people of Porto consume for...
- Porto Delights The past few days have been very active at Casa Aguiar, between houseguests and work and school and my life beyond this website. But despite feeling like I could fall...
- Torresmos, The Portuguese Pork Snack Last night Paulo arrived home with a few things from the grocery store and announced he had something new for me to try, in a small container in case I...
