Italian Bread Salad

Love Italian? Cut leftover white bread into cubes and let them stale a bit to make this easy and brilliant summer salad the Italians invented to use up day-old bread. Wakes up everyone's taste buds and with the bread cubes soaked in the wonderfully assertive dressing it's filling enough to be its own meal. Easy. Serves 6 to 8.

Italian Bread Salad

1 pound lettuce (romaine is nice)
1 large cucumber (English is preferred)
1 large fresh tomato, cut in thin wedges
1 cup sliced red radishes or daikon radish
1/2 pound or 4 cups stale French or Italian bread, cut in 1-inch cubes
1/2 red onion, thinly sliced (don't omit!)
1 cup olive oil
1/2 cup wine vinegar
1 tsp. dried basil or dried mixed Italian herbs
2 or 3 cloves garlic, minced or crushed
1/2 teaspoon salt
fresh-ground black pepper to taste
1/2 cup fresh-grated Parmesan cheese; the stuff in the cans won't work.

Wash the lettuce, pat or spin the leaves dry, tear them into bite-sized pieces. Peel the cucumber and slice. Put the lettuce and cucumber in a large bowl along with the tomato, radishes, bread cubes and onion.

Next, put the oil, vinegar, basil or seasoning, garlic, salt, and some pepper in a blender and blend at high speed for 1 minute. Pour the dressing over the salad, sprinkle on the Parmesan cheese, and toss the salad gently for several minutes.

Chill the salad at least a half-hour before serving. Two or three days from now it'll taste just as good.

Recipe: Zucchini and Avocado Salsa Salad

This foolproof recipe from The New York Times in 2009, written by Martha Rose Shulman requires no skill, just chopping. Here's the link to the published original. I like my own photo and slightly changed recipe better. It works as salad, salsa, taco stuffing or pizza topping. So good it was chosen for the best 250 recipes from the NYT.

Zucchini and Avocado Salsa Salad

1 medium zucchini, cut into small dice
salt to taste
3 medium tomatoes, finely chopped
1 or 2 jalapeno or serrano peppers, seeded and chopped
1/4 to 1/2 cup chopped cilantro or to taste
1 Haas avocado, ripe but not too soft, cut into tiny dice
3 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon or lime juice
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

1. Sprinkle the diced zucchini with salt and drain in a colander for 15 minutes. Rinse if it tastes very salty and drain it on paper towels.
2. Combine tomatoes, chilies and cilantro in one bowl and zucchini, avocado, olive oil and lemon or lime juice in a serving bowl. Put tomato mixture in zucchini mixture and toss gently and salt to taste.

I serve this to guests with home-baked tortilla chips along with drinks. I eat it as salad, but in the Midwest you do not serve guests a main-dish salad. They will wonder where the meat is and why you are cheaping on them.

Make this soon or you'll wish you had. It's September and the homegrown tomatoes and zucchini are getting scarcer. And zucchini already feels a little bit passe.