Simple Avocado Sandwich
Posted by Carson on January 6th, 2009One summer afternoon, I prepared something involving some fairly simple cravings: avocados, onions, and toasted bread. I would suggest this meal for really any time of day, but it is fairly informal—after all, it’s a sandwich. Feel free to experiment with this one, cater to whatever craving you might have at the time. Rebecca baked a loaf of focaccia earlier, and we had just enough to prepare two sandwiches with it.
Simple avocado sandwich on focaccia bread
- ½ medium sized red onion
- 1 avocado
- ½ medium sized green pepper
- sliced havarti cheese
- approximately 50-60mL (¼ cup) balsamic vinegar
- whole leaf lettuce (we used romaine, iceberg works well here too)
- sliced bread
- butter (or margarine, but we had some butter on hand!)
- cooking oil (olive, grape seed, vegetable, etc.)
Although the dish features avocados, I couldn’t help but to make this a warm sandwich involving onion and green pepper. If you’re buying the avocados for this recipe, be sure to buy ripe ones, or allow them to soften up before using them—you’ll want the flesh to give when pressed with your thumb. Avocados do not ripen in the refrigerator; just leave them out, or, if you like, put them in a brown paper bag.
Since small, diced items will fall out of the sandwich, I sliced the onion into rings about half a centimetre wide. Don’t worry about separating the rings out from the slices, they’ll separate as you cook them. Next, slice up the green pepper along its length, forming narrow wedges. These will be long enough to lay along the length of the sandwich, and won’t fall out while you eat it.
“Sweating” differs from the traditional sauté in that the cooking temperature is lower: Flavours are released, rather than seared in. Remember also the golden rule of frying pans: hot pan, cold oil. You want to hear some sizzling when food hits the pan, otherwise the food will simply absorb the oil.
Sweat the onions down in the cooking oil until they are nearly translucent. Pour in the balsamic vinegar, and add the green peppers. We’ll be reducing this vinegar into a thick sauce (reduction), and coating the vegetables with it.
While the vegetables are cooking off, prepare the avocado. I sliced the avocado halves into lengthwise slices, but diced avocado might spread easier onto the sandwich, too. Start toasting your bread as late as possible so it stays hot.
To prepare an avocado, slice along its length, around the pit inside. Grab both halves, and twist them apart; one side will have the pit, the other is ready to use. Using a sharp knife, tap the blade’s length into the pit, twist and pull out. You can now slice up the avocado and remove the skin, or cross-hatch the fruit and spoon out for cubed pieces.Butter your toast, then start assembling your sandwich. A lettuce base, topped with the cooked vegetables, drizzled in the balsamic reduction, a few turns of fresh grated pepper and quickly topped with the havarti. The idea is to melt the cheese.
Handle the avocado slices with care, as a ripe avocado is almost like room temperature butter, and lay the slices on top of the cheese. Top off with the buttered toast, or leave open faced for eating with utensils.
- Although this sandwich is very filling, and works for really any meal, a dinner-time accompaniment such as sweet potato chips (or fries) would pair very nicely.
- Baby leaf spinach would work amazingly well in lieu of lettuce.
- Rebecca disagrees, but some plain cream cheese instead of butter might smooth things out even more.
- We served this with a mango and orange smoothie. The thickness of the drink worked very well with the buttery consistency of the avocados, as well as the crunchy bread.
Since avocados are the feature, a sharp white wine suits this sandwich best. A crisp chardonnay or a sauvignon blanc would pair well.