French Fridays with Dorie: Purple Haze Goat Cheese, Strawberry & Balsamic Tartine

I'm a couple days late on this post, but thankfully I didn't let this week's French Fridays with Dorie recipe pass me up! These Goat Cheese and Strawberry Tartines prove, once again, that extraordinary doesn't need to be complicated. I know what I'll be nibbling on when I get to the park early to set up for Concert in the Park this evening...a couple of these babies with a glass of chilled white wine.

The star ingredients: La Brea Bakery French Demi Baguette; Cypress Grove Purple Haze Goat Cheese, with a subtle hint of fennel pollen and lavender; organic strawberries; freshly ground pepper; and the most decadent aged balsamic vinegar.

Thinly slice the baguette on the diagonal into 1/3-inch thick slices. Lightly brush one side of the slices with extra virgin olive oil and grill them in a grill pan for a minute or two. Allow to cool, spread the goat cheese over the bread, and top each tartine with one or two strawberry slices. Finish with a grind of black pepper and a few drops of syrupy aged balsamic vinegar. Dorie says the balsamic is truly unnecessary and truly good. I say it's most definitely necessary to take these over the top.

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French Fridays with Dorie is an online cooking group, dedicated to Dorie Greenspan‘s Around My French Table: More Than 300 Recipes from My Home to Yours. As members of the group, we have purchased the cookbook and cook along as much as we can. There is a new recipe each week, and we post about that recipe on Friday. We are asked to refrain from posting the actual recipes on our blog. The book is filled with stunning photography, and personal stories about each recipe, which makes it that much more intriguing. I highly recommend adding it to your cookbook collection if you haven't already!