Bread, tomatoes, olives, four sardines, a drizzle of olive oil 

Friselle, sarde alla beccafico and pappa al pomodoro. Will these be the most sustainable traditional Italian dishes because they have a low environmental impact to reign on our tables this summer?

Bread, oil and tomato, a simple association of humble ingredients with a gigantic and impressive sensory force, I find it difficult to think of anyone who does not get to kneel, metaphorically speaking, to such a delicacy of life. After all, the similarities with the most famous pizza are countless, here bread, water, yeast and flour or the parents of bread, here raw tomato, there the one cooked as per tradition, in both the sumptuousness of the oil son of the olives that brings together all the flavors. But despite the simplicity, bread and tomato are a marriage with a thousand different identities, starting with the type and quality of the bread and its being natural or toasted, continuing with the variety of tomato, the discriminating factor of the herbs used to flavor, the presence or absence of garlic and so on. 

Bread and tomato was my childhood snack, my mother was the only "eat" she allowed me for a snack when television or an unscrupulous food industry had still done the enormous nutritional damage they did. Was it a childhood of deprivation? No, it was a great privilege and I never missed anything else for a very simple reason.

This bread, a large bread (qualitatively speaking) of durum wheat semolina of those that I still insist on looking for and that I now find rarely, was every time a surprise. In summer, his companions were the tomatoes in the different versions available according to their natural growth, each time different thanks to the different herbs such as basil, marjoram, oregano, mint, a light dose of salt and before entering the mouth a washed down with good olive oil. In winter the base was the same oil and sometimes only that, but also slices of oranges, dried tomatoes in oil, dried figs and much more that I do not remember now. The point is that there was never boredom in the proposals or maybe even if they were repeated for me they were so good that I had no reason to protest! 

I digressed a bit with my memories, let's go back to today's recipe, one of the many and possible interpretations of bruschetta. Then the choice of two precise aromatic herbs, basil and thyme, one to flavor the tomatoes cut into slices instead of in the classic diced format, the other to give a very pleasant touch to toasted almonds seasoned with raw oil and, of course, thyme. So you have the base of good bread, the softness of tomato married to basil, the crunchiness of toasted almonds embellished with oil and thyme. We are faced with an almost extreme simplicity, but I assure you that it seemed to me an almost sublime perfection. Try it and let me tell you.

Ingredients 

8-12 slices of good homemade wholemeal bread,

about 300 g of cherry tomatoes,

1 bunch of fresh basil,

2 cloves of garlic,

50 g of shelled and peeled almonds,

4-5 sprigs of fresh thyme,

good olive oil,

salt

Preparation

Wash the cherry tomatoes, cut them into round slices and season with 2-3 tablespoons of oil, a pinch of salt, the basil washed and finely chopped, the garlic peeled and crushed, cover and leave to marinate 30 minutes. Meanwhile, in a saucepan at low heat, toast the almonds for about 5 minutes, stirring them often, cool, cut them into fillets and season with 2 tablespoons of oil and the thyme washed and peeled. Toast or leave the bread natural, season with a rich layer of tomatoes deprived of garlic and sprinkle with a little almond flakes with thyme serving immediately.