When panzanella meets caponata, delicious things happen.
This week’s recipe is a mash-up of my two favorite foods ever: panzanella and Sicilian caponata. Panzanella is, of course, a bread salad, usually soaked with the juices of summer’s finest tomatoes and dotted with pieces of squishy fresh mozzarella. Caponata, on the other hand, is a sort of eggplant-based relish—a bit like ratatouille but with a notably sweeter and tangier flavor profile. I smooshed these two iconic dishes together to create a semi-grilled salad made from the best of late-summer produce.
The salad begins with eggplant, bell pepper, and onion, all cut into thick slices and grilled until soft and lightly charred. Once cooled, the grilled veggies get roughly chopped into bite-size pieces to prepare them for a brief marination. Caponata is known for its “agrodolce,” or sweet-and-sour flavor profile. Golden raisins and a pinch of good old-fashioned sugar provide the sweetness, while a combination of balsamic and red wine vinegars bring nuanced tang. Eggplant is essentially a tasty, edible sponge, so it won’t take long to soak up all that flavor. Give the grilled veggies 30 minutes to marinate, and move on to the tomatoes in the meantime.
Juicy, ripe tomatoes are an essential part of any panzanella, and this one is no different. Look for the best ones you can find, cut them into generous wedges, sprinkle them with salt, and let them sit for 15 to 20 minutes to draw out their sweet, umami juices. This will enhance the salad dressing and help soften torn chunks of grilled bread. Speaking of bread, a crusty sourdough will offer the most flavor and be sturdy enough not to disintegrate into the salad. That said, a baguette or other artisan-style bread will work just as well. Just note that if the crust is especially chewy, you might want to remove it before tearing the bread into bite-size pieces.
If you’d rather not fire up the grill on a weeknight (or if you live in a grill-less apartment), you have the option to use your oven instead. For a shortcut version of this recipe, simply cut the raw eggplant, pepper, and onion into bite-size pieces, spread them on a sheet pan with a drizzle of olive oil, and bake them at 375°F for about 25 minutes (be sure to flip everything over once or twice during that time). At this time of year, the weather is usually beginning to cool just enough to make turning on the oven bearable. That said, there are still a few weeks left of summer—and this salad is the perfect way to cram in as much late-season produce as you possibly can.