The other day I was reading a pasta recipe at someone else’s blog, and it got me to craving a salad, so I decided to create my own salad, but using a riff on panzanella. You know, panzanella is Italian for bread salad. I didn’t exactly want a true panzanella that’s mostly bread with veggies in it. I do have a fantastic Grilled Panzanella Salad on my blog in case you’re really wanting that. This time, though, I wanted something totally different. But sort of similar. So here’s my salad. It contains cooked chicken, some pennette pasta (or you can use whatever pasta shape you’d prefer), tomatoes, fresh baby spinach, lemon juice, some home made pesto (we have lots of basil in our garden at the moment) mixed into some cream as the dressing. And, the delicious toasted bread croutons. It took no time at all to make – except for baking the croutons and cooking the pasta. While those two things cooked, I chopped up the chicken, cut the tomatoes, squeezed lemon juice and made the dressing. I’d made the pesto earlier in the day, but you can use bottled pesto. I merely made my own since I had the pine nuts and basil on hand.
Here’s what I did. First I put the water on to boil, since that takes 10-15 minutes. I only used about 2 ounces of pasta, but if you’d like more pasta, by all means, use more as that will stretch the salad to serve more people (just use more dressing). I cut up the ciabatta loaf I had from the day before that was already starting to get stale. I tossed those cubes with some oil (I used grapeseed, but EVOO is just fine too) then sprinkled the cubes with a jarred seasoned garlic salt. Because the bread was damp from the oil, the salt stuck well to the bread. The croutons were baked in a 425° oven for about 5-7 minutes, just until they were golden brown. You want to do those in a hot oven because you want the exterior to brown, but the inside to still have some softness to it. If you baked the bread cubes at 350°, it would take 15 minutes, perhaps, to get them brown, AND they’d be as hard as bricks. That’s not what you want in a panzanella.
There’s the pesto at left, and the golden hued croutons just out of the oven. The leftover chicken I had on hand needed to be cubed up, which I did, the tomatoes halved. Once the pasta was cooked through and drained, I put that in the big salad bowl and squeezed fresh lemon juice over it. Then I began adding all the other ingredients – the spinach, tomatoes, chicken and the asparagus. The croutons were added in on top and I poured the dressing (not all, but most of it) onto the bread and tossed it well, then mixed the entire salad. I wanted the pesto cream to coat the bread first, then the excess would also coat the salad and pasta as well. Add more dressing if it needs it, but I caution you to not use too much. I had fresh baby spinach on hand, but you could use any other kind of sturdy lettuce.
If you’d like you could also shred some good Parmesan on top of the salad. I didn’t think it needed it because the pesto had some. The salad is very malleable – use what ingredients you have on hand. Green beans? Add them. Peas? Good addition too. No asparagus? No worries. No spinach? Add Romaine or even green leaf. Or arugula would be great with this.
The next day I got out what was left over of this salad. It was still delicious. The spinach hadn’t wilted, the bread cubes were only slightly soggy, but full of that good pesto flavor. The pasta had absorbed some of the pesto cream, which was good. It might have benefitted from a little squirt of lemon juice over all of it, but it tasted just fine so I didn’t bother. This salad is full of flavor; it would even be good enough for a warm summer night dinner with guests. Worth making; easy too.
Green Panzanella, Chicken and Pasta Salad
Recipe By: My own recipe, 6/2011
Serving Size: 3
Serving Ideas: If you have some frozen peas on hand, add in a handful of them also. They go great with a spinach enhanced salad, and they taste great with the pesto too.
4 cups bread cubes — cut about 1/2 inch square
2 tablespoons grapeseed oil
2 teaspoons seasoned garlic salt
2 ounces pasta — penne, penette, penne rigate or bowties
2 tablespoons lemon juice
3 ounces baby spinach — or Romaine lettuce
1 1/2 cups cooked chicken — cut in slivers or cubes
1 cup asparagus — steamed, chopped [optional]
1/4 cup pesto sauce
1/4 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup cherry tomatoes — halved
salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
1. Make croutons: preheat oven to 425°. Cut 2/3 of a small ciabatta loaf into cubes and place in a large bowl, then drizzle the oil over the bread, toss with your hands, then add the seasoned garlic salt (the oil will help the salt to stick). Pour cubes onto a large, rimmed baking sheet and bake for about 5-7 minutes until the croutons are golden brown. Remove and set aside.
2. PASTA: cook the pasta of your choice until it’s al dente. Drain and place in the same bowl you used for the croutons. Add the lemon juice and toss gently and allow the pasta to cool. Set aside.
3. Mix the pesto and heavy cream together. Add the spinach, chicken, asparagus and cherry tomatoes to the salad bowl. Pour the croutons over the top and add the pesto cream. Toss the pesto mostly in the bread cubes at first. You may not need all of the dressing – add some, then taste. It’s easy to over-do it, so add and toss, then taste to make sure. Add salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste.
Per Serving: 623 Calories; 32g Fat (45.6% calories from fat); 35g Protein; 50g Carbohydrate; 4g Dietary Fiber; 92mg Cholesterol; 571mg Sodium.
A year ago: Thai Tea
Two years ago: Couscous Chicken Salad
Three years ago: Sarah’s Ginger Scones
Four years ago: Hot as Haiti (a drink)
Marie
said on June 10th, 2011:
How pretty and fresh and delicious this is Carolyn!! I am printing it out and popping it into my “Dream File,” hopefully to be made soon! Hope you’re both well and enjoying some early summer days! xxoo
As I type this, it’s drizzling outside. A bit unusual for June, but I’m not complaining because it means the temps are low. Our summer doesn’t usually arrive until about the 4th of July. Here in Southern California we experience something called “June gloom.” We have cloudy or totally overcast mornings and sometime during the day, often early afternoon the sun pops out and we have pleasant temperatures. . . carolyn t