Winter Toasts with Ricotta and Chardand fried eggs / pine nuts / winter smoothie
These rustic yet "fancy" toasts are piled high with ingredients that have different flavors and textures - ricotta and white beans for creaminess, chard for substance, and pine nuts for a bit of crunch. It's worth buying a hearty bakery loaf of bread for this meal.
Smarts #1: Fry the eggs that top this toast in olive oil to enhance the flavor of the dish. Just be sure to keep the heat at medium because olive oil can burn at high heat.
Smarts #2: Dates are naturally quite sweet, so you may prefer to serve the smoothie at the end of the meal.
Ingredients
- Garlic - 3 cloves, chopped
- Chard, any type - 10 leaves, leaves and stems chopped and separate
- Bread - 8 slices (a good-quality loaf of whole grain, rye, or sourdough are great here, but any sandwich bread will work)
- Beans, white (14 oz / 397 g) - 1 can, drained and rinsed
- Pine nuts - 1 Tbsp (sub chopped pecans or walnuts)
- Oil, olive - 1 Tbsp + 1 Tbsp
- Lemon juice - 2 tsp
- Eggs - 8
- Cheese, part-skim ricotta - 3/4 cup
- Hot sauce (opt) - for serving
- Pears - 2, chopped
- Dates, pitted - 4, be sure to buy dates with the pits removed
- Lemon juice - 2 tsp
- Yogurt, plain or Greek - 1 cup
- Ice - 1 cup
Nutrition Facts
Prep
- Garlic / Chard - Prep as directed. Store separately. (Can be done up to 5 days ahead)
- Make smoothie - Chop pears. Combine pears, dates, lemon juice (portion for smoothie), yogurt, and ice in a blender. Blend until smooth. Taste and add some honey if you’d like the smoothie sweeter or add a splash of water if the smoothie is too thick. (Can be done up to a day ahead)
- Bread - Slice bread (skip if using pre-sliced bread).
- Beans - Drain and rinse.
Make
- Turn on the oven’s broiler. (Note: This is for toasting the bread. Feel free to use the toaster if you’re making fewer servings.)
- Spread bread out in a single layer on a sheet pan and set it near the oven.
- Heat a large saute pan over medium heat.
- Add pine nuts and saute until light golden brown, 2 to 3 minutes. Set nuts aside and return pan to heat.
- To heated pan, add first portion of olive oil and then chard stems. Saute until starting to turn tender, 3 to 4 minutes.
- To chard stems, add chard leaves and garlic with some salt. Saute until chard leaves are tender, 3 to 4 minutes more.
- Stir beans into chard until heated through.
- Remove pan from heat and stir in lemon juice (portion for toasts). Season with some salt and pepper.
- Set greens and beans aside, covered to keep warm.
- Heat a large nonstick pan with second part of olive oil (if you want, you can use the pan you used for cooking the greens - just transfer them to a bowl and wipe out pan before using it).
- Crack eggs into heated oil and cook until done to your liking. (Note: If the pan is really full, it can be difficult to flip the eggs. To help them cook all the way through, cover the pan with a lid, which will help the top part of the whites to cook while the yolks stay runny.)
- While eggs cook, transfer sheet pan with bread to the oven and toast, flipping halfway through cooking, ~2 minutes per side.
- Assemble toast by spreading each slice of bread with ricotta.
- Transfer toast to serving plates and pile greens and beans, pine nuts, and eggs on top of each piece of bread. Season eggs with some salt and pepper.
- Serve toasts with some hot sauce if you’d like. Enjoy smoothie on the side (or save it for dessert).
Nutrition Facts
Reviews
This meal has 31 reviews
I thought this was delicious and a great way to get protein, though it was more work than eggs and toast should be. It would be better to combine this with another meal where you can reuse some ingredients, for a more convenient meal prep.The smoothie was delightful - who knew dates and pears work in smoothies?!
I didn't make the smoothie, which made this a fairly quick and easy light meal, though not very exciting. I would definitely use the hot sauce and a bit more seasoning than I did next time, but that's on me for being lazy.
Though it was pretty good, it felt like this was a lot of hassle for basically toast and cheese. The smoothie was weird. I didn't care for it.
Not a winner with my family
My family loved this. Okay, my 7 year old liked it, but that’s huge for him. They are Swiss chard!
Subbed spinach for chard for iron. Toddler ate toast with ricotta. Really needs good bread.