Finally made Panzanella

I had very little time to make this because my husband had to run out the door to direct the 6th grade play so I didn't have time to follow a recipe.  So I just did my own thing based on the 4 or 5 recipes I had looked at before.  In this post I share some of those recipes.

Ingredients
3 tbspns olive oil
1 small French bread cut into cubes (6 cups)
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 cps of cherry tomatoes halved
1 cucumber, unpeeled, sliced
1 red bell pepper, seeded and cut into cubes
1 green/ yellow bell pepper
1/2 red onion, cut in half and thinly sliced
20 large basil leaves, coarsely chopped
1/4 cp of carrots chopped
1/2 cp of Gouda cubed
black pepper to taste

vinaigrette

4 tbspns of olive oil
3 tbspns of balsamic vinegar
1 tbspn of garlic paste


1. Heat the oil in a pan. Add the bread and salt; cook over low to medium heat, tossing frequently until nicely browned. You may need to add more oil I couldn't quite get the bread to look nice and toasty like all the post on this recipe make it look.  Mix in a large bowl bread, cheese and all the vegetables.

2. Mix all the vinaigrette ingredients in a small bowl and then pour over bread and veggies mix.  Add salt and pepper as needed.

Picture from Farmscape Gardens