This Panzanella Inspired Ciabatta Salad with arugula is a delicious and super flavorful dish with roasted red peppers, capers, olives, and sun-dried tomatoes. It makes a great treat for celebrating, with a festive feel and bold, yet simple, ingredients.
This blog post is sponsored by Sprouts Farmers Market.
Roasted tomatoes and toasted, seasoned ciabatta are just a glorious combination! These two come together for this Panzanella Inspired Ciabatta Salad, plus other amazing flavors to create a comforting appetizer that is perfect to share with loved ones. As Valentine’s Day is coming up, this dish has a celebratory feel with fun, festive notes of red from the tomatoes (roasted and sun-dried) as well as the roasted red peppers.
Not only do these ingredients have festive color for Valentine’s, but they also pack a flavor punch (or kiss!). This dish is highly versatile to add your favorite flavorful add-ins. Here, we used capers, kalamata olives, and dried herbs. However, feel free to use fresh herbs, your favorite type of olive, or even omit based on you and your loved one’s preferences.
Sprouts Farmers Market has all the essentials for making Valentine’s Day a special occasion, your way! You can totally cook up a wonderful meal at home for your loved ones. Sprouts has such an amazing plant-based selection, along fresh produce and staples like Sprouts Artisan Bread that I used for this yummy appetizer.
We absolutely LOVE the ciabatta and find it to be so versatile for a variety of recipes. I always find it to taste fresh with such a deliciously perfect texture. It’s 100% traceable from grain to loaf as well. With plenty of large, airy holes inside and a thin and crispy crust — it’s just SO yummy. The ciabatta makes a great star of the show for this Panzanella Inspired Ciabatta Salad.
HOW THIS PANZANELLA INSPIRED CIABATTA SALAD COMES TOGETHER
This dish times out really well! Plus, you can split up the chopping with your favorite person and make this together (hehe).
You’ll first slice the tomatoes while the oven is preheating and place them into a baking dish. I used an 8×8 glass baking dish. Then simply season them with salt and pepper and some olive oil, then they go into the oven. They should roast until the juices are releasing and the skins are starting to wilt, around 20 to 25 minutes.
While those are roasting, dice up the ciabatta. You’re looking for around 5 cups, and I make them into cubes around 2 cm. It’s ideal to have them not to small but not huge chunks which are difficult to eat.
Grab a large pan and place the cubes in, along with 3 tbsp. olive oil drizzled in. Toast the cubes on medium heat, stirring every minute or so. Feel it out, regarding how quickly your cubes are toasting – near the end, add in the dried spices and nutritional yeast.
Then whisk up the dressing ingredients and chop the roasted red peppers, olives and sun-dried tomatoes. You can cut them to the size that you prefer. During this process, the roasted tomatoes will be done, so remove them from the oven while you finish any chopping/prep.
Lastly, assemble by drizzling a small amount of the dressing into the arugula and place onto the serving platter. Then, top with the toasted ciabatta, roasted red peppers, olives, sun-dried tomatoes, capers, and any additional dressing to taste.
OTHER DELICIOUS SALADS
Charred Cabbage and Lentil Salad
Roasted Tomato Bruschetta with Orange and Rosemary
Panzanella Inspired Ciabatta Salad
Ingredients
- cups ciabatta bread cubes cut in 2cm cubes
- 1 pint cherry or grape tomatoes sliced lengthwise
- 2 tsp. + 3 tbsp. olive oil divided
- ½ tsp. kosher salt divided
- ½ tsp. pepper divided
- 1 tsp. dried basil
- 1 tsp. dried oregano
- ½ tsp. garlic powder
- 1 tbsp. nutritional yeast optional
- 1/3 cup roasted red peppers thinly sliced
- ¼ cup pitted olives roughly chopped
- ¼ cup marinated sun-dried tomatoes thinly sliced
- 3 tbsp. capers
- 1 cup (somewhat packed) arugula
Dressing
- 1 tbsp. olive oil
- Juice of ½ lemon
- 1 heaping tsp. dijon mustard
- Salt and pepper to taste
- 1 tsp. dried chives
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Place the sliced tomatoes into a baking dish along with 2 tsp. of the olive oil, ¼ tsp. kosher salt and ¼ tsp. pepper. Place dish into oven and roast for 20 to 25 min until juices are released and skins are wilting. When done, remove from oven.
- Place a large pan on medium heat. Add the ciabatta cubes into pan along with the 3 tbsp olive oil, ¼ tsp. kosher salt and ¼ tsp. pepper and toss. Cook for 5 to 7 min, stirring occasionally, until lightly toasted / browned. Towards the end of cooking, sprinkle in the 1 tsp. dried oregano, 1 tsp. dried basil, ½ tsp. garlic powder, and 1 tbsp. the nutritional yeast, and stir. Remove from heat when toasted.
- While the ciabatta toasts, whisk up the Dressing in a small bowl (and 1 tbsp. olive oil, Juice of ½ lemon, 1 heaping tsp. dijon mustard, salt and pepper to taste, 1 tsp. dried chives) and slice/chop the 1/3 cup roasted red peppers, ¼ cup olives, and ¼ cup sun-dried tomatoes.
- Assemble salad by tossing the arugula with a small amount of dressing. Arrange arugula on a serving tray. Top with the ciabatta cubes, roasted tomatoes (and their juices), roasted red peppers, olives, sun-dried tomatoes and the 3 tbsp. of capers.
- Drizzle the dressing over the salad as desired.