Deliciously savoury yet sweet - don't stint on the honey, it actually really helps to lighten the saltiness of the blue cheese.
My first post and a bit of an experiment - both in blogging and in working out how best to serve up these rather sophisticated 'small eats'. I split my time between writing novels and helping my husband run our business - it's a wine merchant (I know, I lucked out when I met him) and part of what I do is cater for wine tastings. These have become one of our go-to food and wine pairing dishes - the saltiness and creaminess of the blue cheese goes well with Sancerre and other sauvingnon blancs, or even sweet dessert wines.
Pictured are the ones I made for one of these tastings are are ciabatta, sliced and toasted, smeared with Dolcelatte and then covered in a couple of slices of ripe fig. The bruschettas are then finished with a drizzle of runny honey and a couple of fresh sprigs of thyme.
Variations
Dolcelatte is delicious but you can substitute it for the equally as yummy St Agur, which also conveniently comes in spreadable tubs - easier for when you're doing an en mass catering gig and need to get your spread on.
I've also experimented with sour dough bread. Why? Because the ciabattas often have huge 'baker's graves' in them - some so large that you have to discard the slice. Sour dough is more uniform, but the bread is stodgier - the size and complexity of these slices just lends it self more to the lightness of ciabatta. The search for the perfect base bread continues...
UPDATE: Gluten-free ciabatta rolls (the ones that come four in a pack in the Free From section) are very good - also because they're smaller, so each slice will only hold one piece of fig, making it more of a canape rather than a two/three-biter. Watch out though, as some of the rolls are literally one big baker's grave!
Credit
Inspiration came from Two Purple Figs but I decided not to do any cooking - in a rush to get 40 or so of these out in quick succession, along with other nibbles, meant I couldn't be faffed. But the cheese - especially the runny St Agur - is already practically molten at room temperature and I love the colour of the red fig (keep fingers crossed that the figs you buy, or Mr Ocado delivers, are garnet-coloured and delicious) and bright green of the thyme.