There are summer days when it’s so hot you just don’t feel to cook. And here we are, 38 °C (98 °F in the shadow) and counting: what am I gonna do? Here’s a blueprint of my Panzanella Newyorkese Salad… I’m currently in the Big Apple 😎

You should know that in Italy – more often than not – it all starts with bread, our go to food across il Bel Paese. Surely for our emotional comfort and, unquestionably, for sustenance.

In this case is going to be stale bread (gluten free for me), and whichever salad ingredients you have available. Cucina povera folks, no carb-free diets here!

Whatever recipes are claimed to exist – as with most of the Italian “cucina povera” dishes – it may have started with “pane e cipolla” (bread and onion). As a regional saying goes “pane e cipolla e cuor contento” (bread and onion, and a merry heart).

Cucina povera has been our lifestyle until the 1950s, when the “Italian cooking standards” were de facto for the wealthy. The mantra for the rest of the population was: make the most with what(ever) you got!

You wanna know about Italian cooking? Here is the matrix, the very basic directions to follow:

1. use what you have at hand,
2. include available leftovers, and
3. do not waste food, especially bread…

As the proverb goes: “waste not, want not”

About cucina povera

It roughly translates as “peasant cooking”, but it doesn’t convey the full meaning. In essence, it refers to the simple ways of prepping something to eat, with local ingredients available. An “out of necessity model” adopted across the Italian peninsula over hundreds of years.

It’s an authentic love story with bread, cause “il pane non si butta mai” or “buttare il pane è peccato!” (Never trash the bread, or to throw away bread is a sin). As long as I remember, through bread-recipes like panzanella salad, I doubt my family has ever thrown away a single piece of bread!

There, these are the not-so-secret steps of the Italian ways of cooking (and salad making), and panzanella is one of this no-recipe dish.

The real star of this mini-meal is the stale bread, at least in Italy, than we add:

• some vegetables (tomato, red onion and fresh basil are the most common);
• a generous seasoning (oil, salt and a hint of white wine vinegar);
• we toss everything together and… enjoy.

Even if the widely diffused version calls for tomatoes, in reality you can use any and every salad ingredient you may have, it’s a matter of taste and availability. After all the Italian peninsula (like many other countries) is blessed with so much fresh produce, that using only few of them feels as heresy… Same goes for cheeses, but that’s another story!

I, for one, love adding slices of fresh cucumbers, chopped celery stalk, and few leaves of rucola (arugula or roquette). Purists chill-out please, all’s fair in love and cooking!

Recipe for my Panzanella Newyorkese Salad

Here’s the blueprint for my panzanella salad recipe (with what I had at hand).

Please note that you’re not going to find specific measurements, it’s more of a proportion/ratio improvisation kind of recipe. Hopefully it’ll help you “feel” what is like to prepare the Italian way, and its creative approach to cooking.

A bit like making a cocktail without a jigger – or other measuring tools – but this is a story for another drink 🤔 Cheers to that!

[servings: 2 | total time: 45 minutes | difficulty: easy]
| Please note that the info and directions provided for the recipes are indicative: the end result may vary from person to person |

Ingredients for 2

For the salad

• 2 slices of stale bread (sourdough is the best)
• 2 tomatoes (medium size, red ripe)
• 1 cucumber (medium-small)
• 1/2 celery stalk (I love the part with leaves)
• 1 tbsp red onion (chopped) [*]
• 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
• 2 tbsp of avocado oil
• 4 capers (small size, in salty brine)
• 1 round of black pepper (freshly ground)
• 3 leaves of fresh basil (that’s all I had)

For the salty water

• 1 tbsp of coarse sea salt
• 1 L of water (about 33.18 fl.oz.)

Essential Tools!

• A tea-n-table spoon set
• a kitchen scale with g and oz it’s a “must have”

Tools

• Whatever you have to accommodate 2 slices of bread for soaking
• 1 cutter board
• 1 sharp knife for vegetables
• 1 salad bowl
• 1 small cup to mix the salad dressing

Directions

1. Rejuvenate the bread in the salty water, for a few minutes. Not too long thought, as it will absorb the juices of the veggies, (tastier than water).
2. Meanwhile, chop the tomatoes and place them in a bowl – big enough to hold all other ingredients.
3. As in bread etiquette, tear-off small bite-size from the soaked bread, and throw them into the bowl with tomatoes, followed by the sliced cucumber, chopped celery and onion [*]… I’ve also added a piece of yellow bell pepper that was sitting in the fridge “home alone” 🥹
4. In a cup mix the oil with vinegar, black pepper, and the chopped capers (don’t rinse them, that’ where the umami savoriness comes from). Pour the condiment over the salad and toss everything together.
5. Let it rest for at least 10 minutes, up to 20… it’s the secret step toward deliciousness. The panzanella salad “riposata” is so much tastier 😋
6. Enjoy!

[*] About raw onion (and garlic), and Italian guests (from Italy).

You should know that very few of us enjoy raw ingredients from the allium family, most of the population wouldn’t: the claim is that those ingredient are indigestible/unpalatable. The concern relate to the “strong” smelly breath that follows.

In this case, marinate the onion – for about 15 minutes – in a mix of wine (whatever you have) and a pinch of salt. No wine, no problem, just use some vinegar.

Note: It’s so easy to assemble the dish that you could do it during a picnic in Central Park… so romantic; just beware of ants, insects, and other unwanted guests.

Can you have a picnic in Central Park? But of course you can! Here is their picnic guide.

From the Roman Sonnet La Panzanella (De gustibus):

From the book “A magnà e… a grattà tutto sta a incomincià” – Roman cuisine in verse with recipes by Luigi Carnacina – Edited by the Centro Romanesco Trilussa

Italian Southern Salads on Bread

There are endless Italian Southern salads on bread, that can be done with stale bread, or “fresella” as a base.

Fresella (or frisella) is the crunchy side of a doughnut-shaped yeast-leavened roll that, after an initial baking time, is cut in half (horizontally) and baked again. This double cooking technique (biscottare aka biscuit) is necessary to dehydrate the bread, so that it will keep for a long time.

Finding a gluten-free version is like going for a treasure hunt, so… which “doughnut-shaped yeast-leavened roll” we have in New York City? The bagel, of course, much easier to get GF!

It may be a bit denser than fresella but hey, what’s the step 1 of our cooking matrix: use what you have at hand, so here we go; however that’s another recipe.

In the meanwhile, Buon Appetibilis a tutti!

Interesting Links

• For variation on a theme, check this Mint Panzanella, a great examples of cooking with leftovers!

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ockstyle

I’m an Italian gluten-free Gourmet Traveler+ and a passionate storyteller, writing in English and Italian. Fluently speaking (eating and dreaming) in Italian, English, French, and Russian. When I’m not writing, I cook and test recipes for special diets, and photograph (also on film). Not necessarily in that order. — / — Sono una viaggiatrice buongustaia (la Gourmet Traveler+) senza glutine, appassionata narratrice di storie. Scrivo in italiano e inglese, parlo (mangio e sogno) fluentemente in italiano, inglese, francese e russo. Quando non scrivo, cucino, testo ricette dolci e salate per diete speciali, fotografo (anche in pellicola). Non necessariamente in quest’ordine.