Oven dried tomato and basil rolls

These rolls are what happened to the rest of the dough that I used to make the bread bowls and foccacia here. You can find the recipe in that post, so I'll just outline how I made these here.

I had some cherry tomatoes in the fridge crying out to be used up, so I decided to roast them with a little dried thyme and a drizzle of olive oil. I used a 250g punnet of tomatoes, halved them and roasted fairly slowly, probably on a medium heat (although I can't quite remember, about Gas 4 ish) for a while (oh, this is so precise isn't it!!!) until they looked shrivelled but not cremated. Probably around an hour, but start checking earlier and keep checking. I had other things in the oven at the same time, so I'm not sure exactly how long they took. Remove and allow to cool.

When the dough was ready for shaping, I patted it out into a rectangle, and spread the roasted tomatoes (I probably used about half of the punnet) over the dough, and add a liberal amount of fresh basil. Roll into a sausage and cut 6 slices. I then pinched one side of the slices together to stop the tomatoes escaping from inside, and turned the rolls onto that sealed side, so that the open side faced upwards, see below.

I allowed the rolls to prove for around 40 minutes (I think, again these were a side line to various other things going in and out of the oven) and then baked at 200C/Gas 6 for around 30 minutes - again check to make sure they're not burning.

They were delicious - the sweet tartness of the tomato worked really well with the silky soft, smooth olive oil enriched dough, which was moist and very more-ish. I was really pleased with the way these looked and would definitely make them again. Really good with any Italian meal requiring a bread roll, or with soup for winter lunchtimes. Perfect when there's frost on the ground and a nip in the air.