Loaded toast with creamed spinach and bacon, and cheese

Is it bruschetta? No, it’s just toast. Making bruschetta is a little more involved; this is ever so much simpler. And delighfully more indulgent.

So… this recipe, and the photos accompanying it, are from 2010. That’s before air fryers became a norm and replaced many uses of a traditional oven.

These toasts were popped into a regular electric oven. The instructions include preheating the oven, and so on, all of which you can just skip if making the toasts in an air fryer.

To save time, the oven was switched on and left to preheat while making the bacon and spinach topping for the bread.

Bacon and onion were cooked in butter while the spinach was blanched in a pot of boiling water. The spinach was rinsed, squeezed and chopped before it was added to the lightly browned bacon and onion.

While cooling the creamed bacon and spinach, leftover bread was sliced and toasted lightly to allow a crust to form on the surface. This crust prevents the bread from turning soggy when it soaks up the liquid from the filling.

The bacon and spinach mixture was divided into four portions, and each portion was spread on a slice of toasted bread. The topping was covered with shredded mozzarella, and back into the oven the bread went. When the cheese was gooey, the tray was pulled out and the toasts were ready to serve.

Loaded toast with creamed spinach and bacon, and cheese

Connie Veneracion

Holiday parties and get-togethers inevitably leave us with leftovers. If bread is among the leftovers you have and you're wondering how to make it palatable and attractive, this recipe is a good place to start. It is perfectly tweakable. If, instead of bacon, you have leftover ham, use it. If your cheese isn't mozzarella, so what? Use whatever you have.

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Prep Time 10 minutes mins

Cook Time 20 minutes mins

Total Time 30 minutes mins

Course Breakfast, Snack

Cuisine International

Servings 2 people

Ingredients

  

• 1 tablespoon butter
• ½ cup bacon thinly sliced
• ⅓ cup onion chopped
• 1 cup blanched spinach squeezed and roughly chopped
• 3 to 4 tablespoons cream
• salt to taste
• pepper to taste
• 4 slices bread
• ¾ cup mozzarella (or whatever cheese you have) shredded

Instructions

 

• Preheat the oven to 400F.
• Heat the butter in a frying pan, add the bacon and cook until the edges are lightly browned.
• Add the chopped onion and continue cooking until the onion bits are translucent.
• Throw in the spinach. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Stir and cook for about a minute.
• Pour in the cream. Cook, stirring, just until the cream is bubbly.
• Arrange the bread slices on a tray and toast in the hot oven for about four minutes.
• Take the bread out of the oven. Spread the bacon-spinach mixture on each slice of bread. Top with shredded cheese.
• Return the tray back into the oven and toast the bread just until the mozzarella melts.
• You may garnish the creamed bacon and spinach toast with snipped parsley before serving.