Bruschetta is just tomato salad on toast

Remember the classic question philosophers ask -- What is a man? The more you think about it, the harder it is to answer, even though you 'know' what a man is. On a more mundane level, we all 'know' what a salad is -- but define it, please. Toss bread and tomatoes and you have panzanella (a salad), but put the tomatoes on top of bread and you have bruschetta. Eat your pasta warm and call it dinner, but chill it and it's suddenly salad. Perhaps vegetarians really do eat nothing but salad ... 


Enough. I'm going to blog whatever recipe I want to use whatever definition feels right to me at a given moment. Today, bruschetta is a salad. Tomatoes are in season and we are eating lots of bruschetta. Yesterday we had Parmesan Pepper bread from Zingerman's, recently arrived from the bread club Kim and Craig gave us for Christmas, and it made a great base.

Classic Bruschetta

ripe, juicy, wonderfully tasty tomatoes
finely chopped red onion
pesto (homemade or from a jar)
a wee bit of crumbled feta or freshly grated Parmesan
pressed garlic (optional -- there's already garlic in the pesto)
a little olive oil (optional, occasionally I add a dab of garlic olive oil)
good bread, sliced and toasted (rubbed with oil and garlic if you wish, not necessary)

Combine everything but the bread, then heap the juicy tomato mixture onto the toast just before serving.