BLT Panzanella —rsquo; Summer Tomatoes, Worth Every Jar

The garden is in full production and I am drowning in tomatoes, which is the best kind of drowning. Cherry tomatoes, beefsteaks, romas. They are ripening faster than we can eat them, which means it is canning season again. I spent Saturday in the kitchen with the water bath canner and the mason jars and the specific patience that canning requires, which is the same patience that trucking requires: you do the thing, you do it right, you do it again, and the repetition is not boring, it is meditative.

Twelve quarts of whole tomatoes. Six pints of salsa. Four jars of marinara sauce. The basement shelf is filling with summer in glass, and each jar is a promise: that in December, when the garden is frozen and the fields are bare, I will open a jar and the kitchen will smell like July, and the taste of tomato will carry in it the memory of Josie watering the plants and Tyler building the trellis and the sun warm on my face as I picked them.

Josie helped with the canning this year. She is nine now and old enough to handle some steps: washing tomatoes, peeling after blanching, packing into jars. She was careful and serious and asked a hundred questions, and I answered every one, because questions are how the chain continues. Gayle taught me. I am teaching Josie. Josie will teach someone. The jars will line up on shelves we have not built yet, in kitchens we have not seen yet, and the tomatoes will taste the same, because the recipe does not change, only the hands.

On the road I made a simple pasta in the truck: bow-tie noodles cooked at a rest stop on my portable burner, tossed with olive oil, garlic from a jar, canned tuna, capers, and a squeeze of lemon. It is a five-minute meal that tastes like the Mediterranean, or at least like a parking lot in Nebraska where someone is pretending to be Mediterranean, and the pretending is good enough because the pasta is good and the lemon is bright and the capers are salty and sometimes good enough is all you need.

After a Saturday spent putting up twelve quarts of tomatoes and six pints of salsa, the last thing I wanted was another hour at the stove — but the tomatoes on the counter were so ripe and perfect I couldn’t just walk past them. This BLT Panzanella is what I made with the ones that didn’t make it into jars: the slightly soft ones, the ones with the split skins, the ones Josie set aside because they were “too pretty to cook but too squished to eat plain.” Stale bread, good tomatoes, crispy bacon, and a sharp vinegar dressing — it’s the same instinct as the tuna pasta I make in the truck, which is to say: simple things, done right, are almost always enough.

BLT Panzanella

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 15 min | Total Time: 30 min | Servings: 4

Ingredients

• 6 cups rustic bread (such as sourdough or ciabatta), torn into 1-inch chunks
• 3 tablespoons olive oil, divided
• 6 strips thick-cut bacon
• 2 pounds ripe mixed tomatoes (cherry, beefsteak, or roma), cut into bite-size pieces
• 1/2 small red onion, very thinly sliced
• 3 cups romaine or butter lettuce, torn
• 1/4 cup fresh basil leaves, torn
• 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
• 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
• 1 small clove garlic, minced
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt, plus more to taste
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Instructions

1. Toast the bread. Preheat oven to 400°F. Toss bread chunks with 1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil and spread on a baking sheet. Bake 10–12 minutes, turning once, until golden and crisp on the outside but still slightly chewy inside. Set aside to cool.
2. Cook the bacon. In a skillet over medium heat, cook bacon until crispy, about 8–10 minutes. Transfer to a paper-towel-lined plate and let cool, then break into rough pieces.
3. Salt the tomatoes. Place cut tomatoes in a large bowl, season with a generous pinch of salt, and let sit 5–10 minutes. This draws out the juices, which become part of the dressing.
4. Make the dressing. In a small bowl, whisk together remaining 1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil, red wine vinegar, Dijon mustard, minced garlic, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and black pepper until emulsified.
5. Combine and rest. Add toasted bread to the bowl with the tomatoes and their juices. Pour dressing over and toss well. Let sit 5 minutes so the bread absorbs the tomato juices and softens slightly.
6. Finish and serve. Add lettuce, bacon, red onion, and basil. Toss gently to combine. Taste and adjust salt and vinegar as needed. Serve immediately.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 390 | Protein: 13g | Fat: 21g | Carbs: 38g | Fiber: 3g | Sodium: 680mg