Feta with Pita Panzanella Salad

by Mary Papoulias-Platis

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It’s fall and I turn to this Feta with Pita Panzanella salad without lettuce quite often assembles in my home for a quick salad for dinner. In Greece, you can expect to get salads without lettuce, which is the traditional salad called “Horiatiki”, meaning village salad. But, I kept this salad with a traditional-style, but added my California Twist with the addition of lots of feta! You can also make your own pita, adding spices you love and a splash of evoo. Recipe is below.

Greek Feta Cheese

The addition of pita bead bread is similar to the traditional Italian salad, but I added toasted pita wedges and avocado for my Greek twist. I love to plate my salads (make them up ahead of time on individual plates) to get those beautiful vegetables looking their best!

If you’d like to learn how to make homemade pita bread, my recipe is here.

Homemade Hatch Chile or Plain Pita Bread

Feta with Pita Panzanella Salad

This is my fall version of a Greek salad which includes toasted pita bread- don't skip this step because it brings the salad together by gathering all the juices in the bowl.
Course Salad
Cuisine California Greek
Keyword california greek, feta, pita, salad
Servings 6
Author Mary Papoulias-Platis

Ingredients

Pita

  • 3-4 rounds of pita bread
  • 2-3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 teaspoon dried Greek oregano

Salad

  • 4 large tomatoes, cut into wedges
  • 2 cucumbers, peeled and sliced in rounds
  • 2 each of red and yellow bell peppers, seeded and sliced
  • 1 red onion, peeled and thinly sliced
  • 1/2 pound feta cheese, thinly sliced
  • 1 cup pitted Kalamata olives
  • 2 avocados, peeled and sliced

Red Wine Vinegar Dressing

  • 1 cup extra virgin olive oil
  • 1/2 cup red wine vinegar
  • 2 garlic cloves, minced
  • 1 teaspoon Dijon dressing
  • 1 teaspoon dried Greek oregano
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Instructions

Pita

  1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.
  2. Cut the pita bread in 6 wedges per piece. Cut once more in half. Brush both sides with olive oil.
  3. Sprinkle with dried Greek oregano.
  4. Place on a sheet tray and bake in the oven for 6-8 minutes, turn and continue baking until golden brown. Set aside.

Dressing

  1. In a small bowl add vinegar, garlic, mustard, oregano, salt and pepper and whisk together.
  2. Slowly add olive oil and continue whisking until blended.

Salad

  1. In a large serving bowl gently combine the tomatoes, peppers, onion, cucumbers, and olives and pita wedges.
  2. Add the avocados on top with the feta slices.
  3. Toss gently with the dressing or serve on the side.

 

Don’t skip this step – if you need to save time you can :

  • Make these chips 2 days ahead of time and store them in a plastic bag.
  • Purchase pita chips at your grocery store.

Fresh homemade Pita chips.

Important to know: I just added extra-virgin olive oil and oregano to these chips to reduce salt intake.

Love my salads!

Mary

© 2013 – 2022, Mary Papoulias-Platis. All rights reserved.

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