Have any left over bread and vine ripen tomatoes?
Panzanella is a tomato bread salad that is made with left over crusty bread and the freshest tomatoes and basil you can put your hands on. You can also use that leftover bread to make tomato bread soup. If you find yourself at a farmer’s market, pick up some extra tomatoes to make this salad.
When we were Italy several years ago we ate this salad and also made a wonderful tomato bread soup in a cooking class we took one day at the villa where we stayed. I hope to make the soup in the fall and will share that recipe with you.
Now in our house, if I were to make Italian bread or any kind of homemade bread, there would not be any left over the next day to make either of these dishes and certainly not even enough to feed to the birds. When my kids were younger that was their favorite part of the meal was homemade bread, cornbread, biscuits, and muffins. Growing up we always had homemade biscuits and cornbread. I never attempted to make Italian Bread or French bread until after I got married. I love making bread. There’s just something about getting flour all over the place and myself.