An unusual taste you'll return to.
Ingredients
- 1 old loaf of bread (cut into large chunks)
- 3 red onions (finely sliced)
- 1 cucumber (peeled, seeds scooped out)
- 4 mixed peppers (roasted and skin removed)
- 4-6 tomatoes (washed and cut into quarters)
- (capers, optional)
- 15-20 kalamata olives
- capers
- basil leaves
- thyme
- garlic (roughly chopped)
- olive oil
- butter
For the Dressing:
- 3 cloves garlic
- 100 ml red wine vinegar
- 200 ml olive oil
- 2 anchovy fillets
- salt
For Roasting the Peppers:
- thyme
- 1 whole bulb of garlic (halved across the equator)
- mixed peppers (whole)
- olive oil
Method
- Heat some olive oil and a little butter in a pan, with the roughly chopped garlic and some thyme.
- When the oil is heated add the large chunks of bread, and cook until a rich golden brown colour.
- Remove from the pan and drain on some kitchen paper and allow to cool.
- Put the finely sliced red onion into some boiling water and allow it to sit in the water for 10 minutes.
- Take the onion out of the water and squeeze the excess water out, dry on some kitchen paper.
- Chop the cucumber into large chunks, this will give a different texture to the salad.
- Assemble the Salad:
- Put all the ingredients into the bowl, the cucumber, tomatoes, chopped roasted peppers, capers, olives and some torn basil leaves.
- Mix together well.
- Add the red onions, and finally the large, crispy croutons.
Make the Dressing:
- Put all the ingredients for the dressing into a blitzer and whizz together, check for flavour and seasoning, adjust as necessary.
- Pour half of the dressing over the salad, mix.
- Add more dressing so that each morsel is dressed, but not swimming in dressing.
- Serve the bread salad with some cold meats and any leftover dressing on the side.
How to Roast the Peppers:
- Heat some olive oil, in a large pan, with the garlic and a couple of sprigs of thyme.
- Put the peppers into the pan once hot and brown them as evenly as you can.
- Pour over some more olive oil and put the pan into a preheated oven roughly 180°C-190°C for about 15-20 minutes.
- The skins will be plump still but quite browned.
- Pour the hot peppers into a bowl and cover tightly with cling film.
- The peppers are really hot, so don't attempt to remove the skin at this stage.
- Allow the peppers to cool until you can handle them.
- Gently lift the peppers out of the bowl and the skin will come away easily.
- Use immediately or put the peppers into a jar and pour over the juice and oil mixture that's left in the bowl, this adds great flavour.
