Easy Vegan Avocado Crostini Recipe
Award-winning chef and Cupcake Wars winner Chloe Coscarelli shares a delectable recipe for avocado and beet toast.
Decorated in industrial-French chic, By Chloe in Manhattan’s West Village has the aura of a good-for-you candy shop, full of vegan delights enjoyed by a steady, enthusiastic stream of NYU students and other fashionable types queuing up in the lovely, brightly lit restaurant.
Courtesy of By Chloe/Chloe's Vegan Italian Kitchen
The creation of Food Network’s Cupcake Wars-winning chef and author Chloe Coscarelli, By Chloe features Coscarelli’s delicious, healthy treats: a kale Caesar salad, meatless hamburgers and cupcakes and cookies all prepared without eggs, butter, meat or other animal products. The food is remarkably flavorful and complex, a true surprise for foodies who might think of vegan food as an unimaginative dining niche with few surprises in store.
Courtesy of By Chloe
Courtesy of By Chloe
My son and I stopped at By Chloe on our last visit to New York to sample some of Coscarelli’s imaginative menu, including some shockingly decadent kale cookies-and-cream ice cream, a pesto meatball sandwich and a wickedly flavorful avocado toast.
Coscarelli was nice enough to share a recipe with Made+Remade for her variation on that avocado toast, a smashed avocado and beet crostini.
Smashed Avocado and Beet Crostini
Yields 6 to 8 servings
Recipe Courtesy of Chloe Coscarelli, chef/partner By Chloe, from Chloe’s Vegan Italian Kitchen
INGREDIENTS
- 2 beets (about 1 pound), peeled and chopped into ½ inch pieces
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 2 tablespoons maple syrup
- 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
- ½ baguette, cut into ¼ inch slices on the diagonal
- 1 ripe avocado
- 1 lemon halved
- Freshly ground pepper
- Sea salt
PREP
Preheat oven to 425° F. Line a baking sheet with foil.
METHOD
Toss beets with olive oil and arrange on baking sheet. Season with sea salt and roast for 30 minutes, turning occasionally with a spatula. Remove from oven, drizzle with maple syrup and balsamic vinegar, return to oven and roast for 5 to 8 minutes until caramelized.
Place bread slices on a large baking sheet and drizzle with olive oil. Bake for 5 to 8 minutes, or until lightly browned on top.
In a small bowl, using a fork, mash avocado with juice from half of the lemon. Season with sea salt and pepper.
BUILD
Spread a thin layer of mashed avocado on each crostini.
Top with roasted beets, season with pepper, and drizzle with juice from the remaining lemon half.
