Panzanella

The Italian "bread salad" redolent of poverty, and yet so delicious that the CC challenges any and all of you not to gobble up every morsel, and lick your plates.

For the record, you need "true" sourdough that has gone stale (= dried out completely.) These staled-out breads have very long shelf-lives and will not grow moldy (for reasons to be explained in a future post.)

Ingredients

staled cubed bread
4 tomatoes (as ripe as can be, diced)
1 large red onion (diced)
2 cloves garlic (minced fine)

6-8 tbsp capers (preserved in salt, soaked to remove salt)
anchovies (preserved in salt only if you have them.)

red-wine vinaigrette
sea salt
black pepper

lots of chiffonaded basil

Recipe

Salt the tomatoes; they will let out copious mixture. Separate and whip the liquid with the vinaigrette.

Mix everything together, and chill for just a tad. The bread should be both soaked in the liquid and crunchy.

Texture is as important as anything else.