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 got ripe tomatoes and day-old bread, the best summer Italian bread salad is just a few minutes away!
1day old crusty ‘stale’ breadabout 4-5 cups of stale bread broken into 1 inch chunks
3ripe juicy tomatoes cut into small wedges or cubes
1teaspoonkosher salt
1small red onionsliced thin
2cucumbersunpeeled, seeded, cut into ½ inch slices
1cupbasil
For salad dressing-
2tablespoonwhite wine vinegaror red wine vinegar
1teaspoonDijon mustard
¾cupextra virgin olive oil
1 ½teaspoongarlicminced
Instructions
Slice tomatoes into thin wedges or cut into small cubes.
Salt cut tomatoes with kosher salt. Toss well. Let tomatoes sit in colander with a bowl under it to collect all the wonderful tomato juice. Allow tomatoes to drain the juices for minimum of 15 minutes to a maximum 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 fish, grilled chicken, BBQ chicken, shrimp.
Video
Notes
Nutritional Info – Please keep in mind that the nutritional information provided is only a rough estimate and can vary greatly based on the products used.