Sunny days make me want to get outside and eat all the things and plant or harvest my garden and eat fresh grown tomatoes. Right? We’ve had an unusually warm start to 2016 which is great for us Calgarians but not so great for the farmers and producers who rely on the moisture to plant their seeds.
I am slightly addicted to bread so anything that involved bread makes me happy. Having to make up something for a BBQ I decided on a bread, tomato, parsley salad. Simple but delicious. I picked up some roasted garlic bread, gave it some lovely brown char marks and tossed it with the tomatoes. Don’t dress your salad or even add the bread until you are ready to serve it or the bread gets soggy. And serve it immediately for as it sits the bread soaks up the tomato and dressing goodness and it becomes soggy. A little added chunky salami or even cooked chicken would make this the perfect meal in one.
Since I’m using garlic bread I opted not to add garlic to my oil. This dish is beautiful served alongside grilled steak or chicken.
Ingredients
- 4-5 slices of day old bread cut about 1 inch think
- 2 tbsp + 1/4 cup olive oil
- 5 large ripe beefsteak tomatoes
- 1/4 cup red onion or scallions minced
- 1/2 cup feta crumbled
- 2 tbsp fresh basil chopped
- 1/4 cup fresh flat leaf parsley chopped
- 2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
- salt and pepper
Instructions
- Pour 2 tbsp of olive oil into a small bowl and with a pastry brush drizzle and dot it over your bread. Grill over medium high heat for 1-2 minutes or until pale golden. Tear into pieces, or cut into cubes. Set aside.
- For the dressing, whisk together ¼ cup olive oil and balsamic vinegar.
- Chop tomatoes into large pieces and add to a large bowl. Toss in onion, feta, parsley, basil, and bread.
- Pour dressing on salad and season well with salt and pepper.
- Allow salad to sit for 30 minutes for flavours to blend.
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