The picture above isn’t the one that I had planned to use for this post. I imagined bringing a foil parcel of roasted tomatoes and cheese fresh from the barbecue to the table, opening it and inhaling the amazing smells as the steam rushed out and then taking a picture of the beautiful contents. Clearly this didn’t happen, what actually happened was that I brought a foil parcel of loveliness, went back to check the other things still on the grill and returned to find it opened and mostly consumed with no pictures taken. So instead you get a pre-fire picture, but it’s still pretty.
So many times when you go to a barbecue and are faced with a mountain of meat and not much else, which is just nuts when there are so many amazing other things that take moments to prepare, a super short time to cook on the fire and taste amazing.
There are all of the super obvious things; slices of pepper, cobs of corn or maybe the cliché but still tasty ‘vegetable kebab’ – chunks of mushroom and onion with some other random bits and pieces sandwiched inbetween. It really doesn’t have to be this dull though! There are all sorts of interesting things you can do with aubergines, asparagus, fennel or maybe Tomato and Cheese!
There are only five ingredients and I’m not going to list any quantities. This is all al fresco excitement so just use your own judgement and whatever you end up with is going to taste pretty amazing. I would only suggest not being too liberal with the vinegar because it can overpower things – any variety of vinegar you fancy is just fine, but balsamic works well. So you will need:
- Small tomatoes of some kind (on the vine if it’s possible)
- Feta
- Fresh rosemary and/or thyme
- Olive oil
- Vinegar
Apart from that lot you are going to need something to wrap it in. Foil is the obvious choice, either buy the ‘extra strong’ kind or just make a double layer (or both if you are feeling cautious).
Let’s make parcels
- Cut some lengths of foil long enough to be able to fold up at the ends to create parcels.
- Throw a handful of tomatoes (still on the vine if you have it) into each parcel and crumble in some feta.
- Add a decent amount of fresh herbs and season well with sea salt and black pepper.
- Lift the sides and ends of the foil up to form a package, then add some a little olive oil and vinegar and close the top by folding the edge over a few times.
- Chuck your parcels on the grill and let the hot coals work their magic for about 20 minutes.
- Open your little foil packages of wonderfulness and serve.
All that remains for you to do is breathe in the amazing smells and look slightly smug as all of your guests praise your skills even though you have actually done very little.