Italian Crostino with beans cream

Classic Italian Crostino With Bean

What You Need

Loaf of rustic olive bread, sliced along the diagonal
1 head of garlic
About 2 pounds of fava beans
Créme fraiche
Handful of fresh parsley
Mushroom olive oil (or regular if you can’t find mushroom)
Sea salt, fresh ground pepper

How to do

Preheat your oven to 425F. Chop off the top of a head of garlic, sprinkle with salt and olive oil. Cover with foil and roast in the oven, cut side up, for 45 minutes. Remove from foil and let cool. Meanwhile, prepare the fava beans.

Shell the fava beans and blanch in boiling water for 30 seconds. Submerge in ice water, then drain. Peel again exposing the bright green beans inside. Heat up a sauté pan and add about 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Sauté the fava beans on medium-high heat for about 10 minutes. Don’t stir for the first four minutes – let the beans get slightly brown. Add salt, pepper and chopped parsley. Turn off heat.

Arrange the slices of olive bread on a baking sheet. Brush a thin layer of mushroom oil on top. Bake at 350F for ten minutes. Put the oven on broil, and broil for about one minute on each side. Be careful bread doesn’t burn.

Squeeze the roasted garlic into a small bowl. Add a generous amount of creme fraiche and a sprinkle of sea salt. Stir well, breaking up the garlic as you do so. Taste for salt, the créme fraiche should no longer taste sweet.

Spread the créme fraiche on the olive bread slices, and top with fava beans. Drizzle mushroom oil over each slice.