Panzanella, aka Bread Salad

Considering the lovely weather today, I popped over to the lovely city of Bath to have a nice wander round in the sunshine. I don't know the place that well so my wandering was fairly aimless, but I had a lovely time. The one low point was encountering a frozen yoghurt shop that had aggressively loud music being piped outside by, I shit you not, an actual DJ. In a yoghurt shop. After shedding a brief tear for humanity, I checked out some of the lovely delis to cheer myself up (and get something for dinner). In Chandos' Deli I found a beautiful load of red and yellow tomatoes, and some fancy bread aswell. You know what you can do with bread and good tomatoes? Other than tomato sandwiches, I mean. Panzanella! Basically the two things chopped up and mixed together! I love it when something that ludicrously simple not only works but even has a name to make it sound all proper.

You will need: 

250g bread, (half a baguette is about right)
250g good quality tomatoes, a mix of varieties is best
25g chopped fresh basil
100g hard goat cheese, grated
Salt and pepper
1 clove of garlic, crushed
A good glug of olive oil

Chop the tomatoes and cut the bread into about even pieces. Mix everything together in a bowl, and leave to macerate for about half an hour. Then eat it.

This will make two large servings if you're having it on it's own for dinner (I did), but four if it's a side dish.

Usually I wouldn't stipulate getting the best ingredients. Obviously it helps, but we're all on budgets here, aren't we? Unfortunately, this really lives and dies with the tomatoes so don't bother making it unless you've got a really ripe and tasty lot.

This is great hot weather food. I will never be able to convince myself just to have a salad for dinner, so the bread here is essential to make it feel like you've actually eaten something, and since it absorbs all the delicious juices I'm pretty sure it counts as a vegetable. Trust me.