If you have a day old bread lying around, turn it into this delicious and healthy salad. This is a simple bread salad perfect for lunch or as a side dish.
Fresh bread doesn’t stay fresh for too long! It is hard to see good bread go to waste, especially because I had my heart set on a variation of my bruschetta recipe
So, I did what was only logical!
Life had handed me day-old bread and I turned it into a delicious Greek style simple bread salad. It turned out to be an absolutely perfect way to use the French bread.
I couldn’t have asked for a better way to use up the bread.
For this salad, I wanted there to be a little crunch from the bread. Crunchy bread is what makes this salad stand out.
So, next time you have extra bread lying around, I suggest you don’t waste it by throwing it away or worse yet, turning it into croutons!!! Put it into a bread salad or make panko breadcrumbs out it.
This simple bread salad is so easy to make and it only takes a few ingredients that you will probably have in your kitchen anyway. Don’t forget the extra garlic that my recipes are known to have.
The olive were last minute addition. I went with black olives and manzanilla olives because they have a natural salty flavor. The red onions were added raw because I love the crunch they brought to the recipe.
There is no cheese in this recipe because it is perfect without it. If you are inclined to choose some cheese, I have a vegan feta cheese that you can use in the recipe.
I refrain from calling this a panzanella salad because there are 2 things different from the traditional panzanella. I didn’t use stale bread and I didn’t soak the bread.
Do you know a strange thing I did for this recipe? I bought these beautiful tomatoes on the vine with every intentions of putting them into this simple bread salad. I really did!
But when I took them out of the bag, I couldn’t bring myself to cut into them!!
Would you cut into these PERFECT tomatoes?
Look how pretty they are! I actually had to go back to the store and get other “not so pretty” tomatoes on the vine!
Check out my ribollita recipe where I make use of tomatoes on the vine with bread. Its a delicious Tuscan bread soup.
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Simple Bread Salad
Note: Make this salad about 40 minutes before you are ready to serve it.
1) Preheat oven to 450 degrees
2) Take one long French bread that is about a day old. Make sure it has sesame seeds on it because it is delicious. Cut it into bite sized pieces. Place them in a large bowl and add 2 tsp of extra virgin olive oil. Add 1 tsp dried parsley to it and mix well.
3) Place the bread on a baking tray and put it in the oven. Toast the bread until it is light brown. Remove it and set it aside to cool
4) Cut 3 tomatoes on the vine into bite sized pieces. I used tomatoes that were not ripe just yet. Do the same for the green pepper. I used about 1/2 of a green bell pepper for this recipe.
5) Put them in a bowl and add 2 tsp of extra virgin olive oil. Add 1/2 tsp of salt, 1 tsp of ground black pepper, 3 cloves of garlic (thinly sliced) and 1 tsp of dried oregano
6) Place that mixture onto a baking tray and bake for about 15 minutes or until the tomato skin wrinkles. Remove from the oven and let it cool
7) Take about a 1/4 cup of chopped red onions (bite sized pieces) and add it to a bowl
8) Add 1/4 cup of black olives and a 1/4 cup of manzanilla olives to the bowl.
9) Add the roasted veggies to the bowl. There will be some liquid in the baking tray that was roasting the veggies. Put that liquid in the same bowl with the veggies and olives
10) Add 1 tsp of balsamic vinegar and mix well
11) Add the bread to the bowl and mix well. Top with 1 tsp of capers and cilantro
Serve immediately
Simple Bread Salad Made Greek Style
Ingredients
For the bread
- 1 French bread make sure it has sesame seed
- 2 tsp extra virgin olive oil
- 1 tsp parsley dried
For the veggies
- 3 tomatoes on the vine, cut into pieces
- 1/2 green bell pepper
- 2 tsp extra virgin olive oil
- 1/2 tsp salt optional
- 1 tsp ground black pepper
- 3 cloves garlic (thinly sliced)
- 1 tsp oregano dried
- 1/4 cup red onions bite sized pieces
- 1/4 cup black olives
- 1/4 cup manzanilla olives
- 1 tsp balsamic vinegar (optional)
- 1 tsp capers
- cilantro
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 450 degrees
- Cut bread into bite sized pieces and place them in a large bowl
- Add extra virgin olive oil and dried parsley to it, mix well
- Place the bread on a baking tray and put it in the oven.
- Toast the bread until it is light brown (about 7 minutes). Remove set aside
- Add tomatoes and bell pepper into the same bowl that had the bread
- Add extra virgin olive oil, salt, black pepper, garlic and dried oregano
- Place that mixture onto a baking tray and bake for about 15 minutes
- Add red onions, black olives and manzanilla olives to the same bowl
- Add the roasted veggies to the bowl along with all the roasting juices
- Add balsamic vinegar, bread and mix well
- Top with capers and cilantro
- Serve immediately
Manju | Cooking Curries says
I love the addition of bread to this. It makes it more filling – salads always make me hungry after a little while. Love that you didnt soak it and left it crunchy, adds so much more texture to the salad.
Healing Tomato says
Thank you, Manju
linda spiker says
I love this idea. And the photos are stunning!
Sandra Shaffer says
The toasted bread looks like it has the perfect texture and crunch for a super satisfying salad! Love all the flavors you combined in this dish. I won’t be tossing any leftover bread for sure now!
Debra C. says
Bread salads are so delicious and the tip of using bread with the sesame seeds is a great way to add additional flavor, YUM! Your salad looks absolutely scrumptious and I would savor every bite!
Healing Tomato says
Thank you, Debra. I really like bread with sesame seeds because it has an added crunch.