Appetizers shouldn’t take very long to make — especially when the main dish takes a while to prepare. If you plan on making a homemade pasta sauce, odds are you don’t want to spend any extra time making an appetizer. But, the meal probably feels incomplete without something else to complement it.
Whenever I make a homemade pasta sauce, I usually always go with a quick Vegan Bruschetta as an appetizer! I love to use fresh herbs in most of my recipes, but for this one, I always use ingredients that I have around the house.
When you chop all of the ingredients by hand, this vegan bruschetta recipe usually takes about 30 minutes. But, if you want to make it even faster and skip the chopping altogether, you can use a food processor to speed up the process!
Vegan Bruschetta Ingredients
- Baguette
- onions
- tomatoes
- garlic cloves
- dried basil
- olive oil
- balsamic vinegar
- salt & pepper
Recipe Instructions
The one ingredient that you will need for this recipe that you might not have around your house is a baguette. You can get baguettes in the bakery section of almost any grocery store, and they are usually plant-based. Just check the list of ingredients!
After you preheat your oven, cut the baguette into thin slices that are about 1/2″ thick. This recipe makes enough toppings for about half of a baguette, but this can vary depending on how much you put on each slice. To avoid wasting any of the bread, don’t slice too much of the baguette and only slice more as you top them. Place each piece on a baking sheet.
Next, start chopping your topping ingredients. Chop up onions, tomatoes, and garlic and put them in a bowl. Combine these with olive oil, dried basil, salt, and pepper. Once you stir all of these together, you are ready to top the baguette slices!
With a small spoon, place a scoop of the topping mixture on each baguette slice. Depending on how thick you top them, you might have some leftover. If this happens, just cut more slices and make more bruschetta!
After you’re done topping them, place them in the oven for about 15 minutes. If you want extra crunchy bruschetta, leave them in for a bit longer.
When they are done cooking, remove them from the oven and pour a little balsamic vinegar on each one. Be careful to pour slowly — if you add too much balsamic, it can easily overpower the rest of the flavors.
How to make plant-based bruschetta even faster: If you want to skip all of the chopping, just toss all of the topping ingredients into a food processor and pulse until everything is chopped! Just make sure you don’t puree the ingredients.
Vegan Bruschetta
Equipment
- small food processor
Ingredients
- ½ baguette
- ½ small onion chopped
- 2 Roma tomatoes diced
- 1 tbsp dried basil
- ¼ tsp salt (or to taste)
- ¼ tsp pepper
- 1 garlic clove minced
- 4 tsp olive oil
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Cut half of a baguette into ½-inch slices and place on a baking sheet.
- Chop tomatoes, onions, and garlic. In a bowl, mix these together with dried basil, olive oil, salt, and pepper. (To speed up the process, pulse these items in a small food processor until chopped)
- Scoop some of the topping mixture onto each baguette slice. Cut more of the baguette if you have some left over.
- Bake the bruschetta in the oven for 15 minutes.
- Pour some balsamic vinegar on each slice to serve.