Turkey Sandwich Panzanella

The other day I bought some delicious whole grain crusty bread from Trader Joe's. I only used half of it for my recipe and then it just sat there. Sad and lonely.

Like I said last week, I'm working on using up the extra food that I'm sometimes left with from my recipes. And since the mussel pasta came out so successful, I figured that there was some creative way that I could use this leftover bread. Wasn't it serendipitous then (haha I love that word) that I came across a panzanella recipe from Heidi over at 101 Cookbooks.

Panzanella is basically a bread salad. By dressing up day old bread with some dressing and other ingredients (often tomatoes and basil) you bring it back to life in a new way. What a great way to use up what you have!

So I made it an entire meal of leftovers by using some of my sandwich fixings that were on their way out. And thus this turkey sandwich panzanella was born. The great part is that you can use older bread than would really work on a sandwich, plus you can add in more veggies than you might want piled up between your bread normally. Feel free to adapt this with your favorie sandwich ingredients. Also, make sure you're generous with the dressing (mine could probably used even more than what I did here) as the bread will soak it right up.

Turkey Sandwich Panzanella

Serves 2

2 thick slices day old whole grain crusty bread, cubed

1/2 avocado, diced

1/2 red bell pepper, diced

1 cup arugula

1 slice cheese, diced (I used a pre-sliced pieces of lactose free yogurt cheese)

4 slices deli turkey, diced

Salt and pepper

Dressing:

2 tsp olive oil

1 1/2 tsp dijon mustard

1 1/2 tbsp red wine vinegar

1/2 tsp honey

Juice of 1 lemon

Mix together all of the salad ingredients.

In a separate small bowl whisk together dressing ingredients.

Pour dressing ingredients onto salad and stir to combine. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.