Project Foodie - Spring Panzanella a Leftover Creation

Spring Panzanella a Leftover Creation

Written by foodie pam

Friday, 25 May 2007

The Leftovers

As host of the May Leftover Tuesdays event I wanted to create an great leftover dish which of course meant I couldn't think of anything to make! Early this week I decided I'd just go with simple and planned on grilling a chicken and making a chicken and pasta dish with the leftovers. Nothing wrong with chicken and pasta - in fact Husband often requests just such dishes - but it wasn't as creative as I had wanted. Fortunately for me, my leftover creation just sort of fell in my lap. See, I had been planning on making Pasta Primavera from the May issue of Cooking Light but what I didn't realize was it was a truly high ranking leftover generating recipe. The recipe calls for green beans, broccoli, asparagus, and cherry tomatoes (among other items) yet only uses 2 cups broccoli, 1/2 cup asparagus, and one cup tomatoes. Since my grocer sells those items in larger quantities the result was that I had most of my asparagus, a good portion of the broccoli and some tomatoes leftover just in time for Leftover Tuesdays. What luck and total happenstance.

The Creation

Creating something out of these leftover vegetables was really easy. Panzanella is one of our favorite summer vegetable dishes so why not apply it to these leftover vegetables? And the only things I had to buy were a few more tomatoes, some bread and fresh mozzarella. For the Panzanella, I roasted the vegetables - taking care to roast each on its own pan since vegetables of different shape and density roast at different speeds - and then combined the vegetables with some fresh mozzarella, toasted bread cubes, and olive oil. A really quick, simple, and very tasty creation from a nice odd assortment of leftover veggies!

Guess I'll hold off on the grilled chicken...

Can't wait to see everyone else’s leftover creations!

Spring Panzanella

1 1/2 cup Asparagus
2 cups Broccoli
1/2 cup Green Beans
2 cups Cherry Tomatoes
1/2 lb Fresh mozzarella, cut into bite-sized cubes
1/2 loaf crusty Italian bread.
1/2 cup olive oil plus 3 Tablespoons
3 Tablespoons balsamic vinegar
2 Tablespoons fresh basil, chopped
1 clove garlic
Salt and pepper

1. Puree garlic by mashing it and mixing with 1 teaspoon salt. Blend with 1/2 cup olive oil.

2. Cut bread into bite-sized pieces and toss with 3 Tablespoons garlic infused olive oil. Roast at 375 for about 10 minutes until toasted.

3. Cut vegetables into bite-sized pieces. Individually, toss each with a tablespoon olive oil, and 1/2 teaspoon salt and pepper. Roast at 375 for about 20 minutes turning about half-way. Watch vegetables while roasting as some types will roast faster than others.

4. Mix garlic infused olive oil with balsamic vinegar. Combine all ingredients, toss and serve.

Note: Both the amounts and types of vegetables are completely variable. Just use whatever you have on hand the result will still be great.

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Noshtalgia

Julie (Unregistered) 2007-05-28 10:28:17

That one looks really good with all the green veggies in it. I'll have to try that one, I have always had mine with mostly tomatoes, olives and basil with a little bit of onion.

pam (Publisher) 2007-05-28 11:10:03

Thanks Julie - I have to try your version too! But either way you really can't go wrong with Panzanella no matter what veggies you put in it...

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