Easy Panzanella Salad (Tuscan Tomato and Bread Salad)

Panzanella salad is a Tuscan salad made of chunky lightly toasted crusty bread, tomatoes, red onions, cucumber, and Italian basil all soaked in the simplest salad dressing. If you have ripe tomatoes and day-old bread, the best summer Italian bread salad is just a few minutes away!

Use juicy ripe summer tomatoes that are available in abundance during the season to make delicious simple salads like cherry tomato salad, roasted cherry tomatoes, or marinated tomatoes salad.

Jump to:

• Why does this salad work
• Ingredients
• Variations
• Step-by-step instructions
• Servings Suggestions
• Storage
• Tips
• Recipe FAQs
• Other Summer Salad Recipes
• 📋 Easy Panzanella Salad (Tuscan Tomato and Bread Salad)

Why does this salad work

1. It’s simple and easy to make a summer salad.
2. Great way to use day-old stale bread (note stale bread does not mean bread with molds, it means bread that is days old), which otherwise might end up in the bin.
3. The best way to use bountiful fresh ripe juicy tomatoes is to create a quick and easy picnic-perfect side dish.
4. Refreshing side dish for grilled chimichurri chicken, pork, or seafood.

Ingredients

For dressing-

1. Bread– best to use dense crusty bread like sourdough bread ciabatta or artisan loaf bread. I wouldn’t recommend you to use dinner rolls. Softer bread won’t hold its shape and will turn mushy once salad dressing is added to it. Note stale bread does not mean old bread with molds.
2. Tomatoes– use the best quality juicy ripe tomatoes for this recipe. Ripe Roma tomatoes and heirloom tomatoes are best.
3. Cucumber– I like to keep the skin on and remove the seed. You can skip removing seeds and simply slice them into ½ inch slices.
4. Red onion– did you know Panzanella salad was based on onions and not tomatoes until the 20^th century? Red onions are great in salads, if you don’t like the sharp astringent flavor of raw onion, use pickled red onion.
5. Fresh basil– Italian sweet basil is what you have to use to make this salad. Do not substitute with any other variety of basil.
6. White wine vinegar or red wine vinegar can be used to make dressing.
7. Extra virgin olive oil– use good quality EVOO.

Variations

Other ingredients such as anchovies, capers, olives, lettuce, celery, carrots, instant pot hard-boiled eggs, and bell peppers can be added to the salad.

Step-by-step instructions

• Pick the best quality juicy ripe tomatoes. Slice into thin wedges or cut into small cubes.
• Salt cut tomatoes with kosher salt. Toss well. Let tomatoes sit in a colander with a bowl under it to collect all the wonderful tomato juice. Allow tomatoes to drain the juices for a minimum of 15 minutes to a maximum of an hour.
• Meanwhile, prep other ingredients.
• Slice red onions. Cut the ends of the cucumber, and peel the seeds using a melon baller or spoon. Cut the cucumber into ½ inch slices. If you don’t like the skin on cucumber feel free to peel the skin.
• Cut bread into 1-inch chunks. Toast bread in olive oil until lightly browned on all sides. You can toast bread chunks in the oven or air fryer too.

• To the tomato juice that was drained add white wine vinegar, Dijon mustard, minced garlic, salt, and pepper to taste, and extra virgin olive oil.
• Whisk well.
• Gather all salad ingredients into a large salad bowl- drained tomatoes, sliced onion, sliced cucumber, toasted bread, and fresh basil leaves.
• Pour the dressing over the salad.
• Toss well.
• Let sit for a minimum of 5 minutes to a maximum of 1 hour so the salad marinates and sucks all the flavors and juices.
• Enjoy with grilled chicken, BBQ chicken, and shrimp.

Servings Suggestions

This salad pairs well with grilled meat, grilled tilapia, and shrimp. It pairs beautifully with BBQ chicken or grilled chicken, grilled steak, and pork chops.

Storage

This salad doesn’t hold good to be stored for days. As soon as it’s made, allow the salad to marinate in the dressing for an hour, longer than that croutons will soften and turn mushy.
If you plan on storing longer for a few days in the refrigerator, reserve the croutons for later.

Tips

1. Day-old bread. Traditionally this salad starts with day-old stale bread. I like the bread to have a nice crust, so I cut bread into bite-sized pieces and shallow fry in a pan with olive oil (and sprinkle of salt on top). If you prefer to use fresh bread, make sure you don’t skip this step of shallow frying bread. You can also toss bread in the oven until crunchy and golden brown.
2. Sweating tomatoes. I highly recommend you don’t skip this step. Adding salt to tomatoes will make them sweat all their juices and release excess moisture. Without removing excess moisture from tomatoes the bread would get too soggy from tomato juice.
3. Serve within a couple of hours. Panzanella salad is served best right after it’s made. You can allow the salad to marinate in the dressing for 30 minutes to an hour, longer than that croutons will soften and turn mushy.
   If you plan on storing longer for a few days in the refrigerator, reserve the croutons for later.

Recipe FAQs