Jalapeño Cornbread Panzanella Salad
Updated May 21, 2019
I love traditional panzanella salad, an Italian bread salad with tomatoes, basil, olive oil, and balsamic vinegar. It is one of my favorites. I also love creating new recipes, so instead of making the same old panzanella salad I decided to create a panzanella salad with a twist! I made a Jalapeño Cornbread Panzanella Salad that gives the classic panzanella a run for it’s money. It is tasty!
This isn’t your typical salad. You won’t find any leafy greens here. No siree! Instead you get cubes of toasted jalapeño cornbread and lots of other goodies! A carb loaded salad? Who’s in? Both of my hands are raised.
I made a pan of homemade jalapeño cornbread, cut the bread into cubes, and toasted them in the oven. I could have stopped right there and eaten the whole baking sheet, but I had my mind set on this salad so I only ate a couple cubes…or maybe it was a couple of handfuls:) Who’s counting?
If you are feeling lazy, you can use store bought cornbread or a box mix, but I promise you the jalapeño cornbread is worth the extra effort. And it really isn’t hard.
I tossed the jalapeño cornbread cubes with charred sweet corn, avocado, peppers, tomatoes, cilantro, red onion, and cotija cheese.
I drizzled a simple cilantro lime dressing over the salad and gave it a good toss! We served the Jalapeño Cornbread Panzanella Salad at one of our BBQ’s and it was a smashing success! Everyone loved it!
There aren’t any greens involved, but a salad is a salad. So eat up! This Jalapeño Cornbread Panzanella Salad is delish!
Jalapeño Cornbread Panzanella Salad
Ingredients
For the Jalapeño Cornbread:
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 cup course ground yellow cornmeal
- 4 tablespoons granulated sugar
- 2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup buttermilk
- 3 tablespoons unsalted butter melted and cooled
- 3 tablespoons canola oil
- 2 large eggs
- 1 cup fresh sweet corn kernels
- 1 jalapeño diced, seeds removed
For the Dressing:
For the Salad:
- 1 ear charred sweet corn kernels removed from cob
- 1 green pepper diced, seeds removed
- 1 red pepper diced, seeds removed
- 3 medium tomatoes chopped
- 1 large avocado diced, seed removed
- 1/4 cup chopped cilantro
- 1/4 cup diced red onion
- 1/4 cup cotija cheese
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Grease a 8x8 glass baking dish and set aside.
- In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, cornmeal, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the buttermilk, melted butter, oil, and eggs until well blended. Pour the liquid ingredients over the dry ingredients and mix with a rubber spatula until combined. Fold in the sweet corn and jalapeño. Pour the batter into the prepared pan.
- Bake for 17-20 minutes, or until the edges are golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the center of comes out clean. Transfer the pan to a rack and cool completely.
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Cut the cooled cornbread into 1-inch cubes. Place the cubes on a large baking sheet and toast until slightly golden brown, about 20 minutes, turning the cornbread cubes once. Remove the cornbread from the oven and cool completely.
- To make the dressing, in a small bowl, whisk together the lime juice, olive oil, garlic, cilantro, honey, salt, and pepper. Set aside.
- In a large bowl, combine jalapeño cornbread cubes, charred corn, peppers, tomatoes, avocado, cilantro, red onion, and cotija cheese in a large bowl. Drizzle dressing over the salad and toss. Serve immediately.
Have you tried this recipe?
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What a great idea! I”m making corn bread this evening and I love the idea of using it for croutons. That’s a beautiful salad!
This looks so lovely!! Panzanella is amazing, but I’m loving the cornbread in this!
I love homemade croutons and this idea of using jalapeño cornbread is awesome! I can’t wait to eat a whole pan of them…I mean, try them!
I love, love, love your cornbread panzanella!! So colorful, so pretty and the jalopeno is awesome!
Carb salads for the win!! LOVE this, Maria!! 🙂
What a great way to shake up panzanella salad!
Jalapeno cornbread crouton panzanella salad is a great idea! I am definitely going to have to try!
This is like a southerner’s dream!! Love it!
Jalapeno cornbread sounds so addictive! I could, like you have just eaten that but so worth it to wait!
Oooh spicy! Love it!
this sounds and looks SO good. i love cornbread in anything but the jalapeno makes this extra special!
This looks delicious, Maria! Can’t wait to try it!
Jalapeños are underrated in my opinion, they deserve to be in everything! Loving this salad, thanks!
Wow- this looks amazing Maria. I can’t wait to try it. Yum!!
Very tempting salad!
Uhh yes! Jalapeno cornbread + salad? Sounds like a delicious balance to me! 😉
I just love this play on panzanella!! It is a great looking salad!
Such a creative spin on panzanella, I love it!
Panzanella salad is one of my favorites, but this version sounds so good! I love the Mexican twist – right up my alley!
Fantastic recipe, Maria! Love the panzanella play.
Pass the fork! You had me at homemade cornbread.
Gorgeous! Great, great colors! 🙂 This looks amazing.
Um, can panzanella salad be epic? Because this jalapeno version is off the chain!!
A perfect combo. This might be the most beautiful Panzenela i’ve seen, and I’m sure it taste ridiculously good.
What a beautiful, beautiful salad! Jalapenos are perfect in a crunchy mix just like this at the end of the summer. Just lovely!!!
ok, I am officially obsessed with this.
Just had this awesome salad for dinner. SO GOOD! Thanks Maria for a great recipe!!
you had me at avocado! I’m all over it lately!! love how different this is Maria!
What a great idea! I love seeing new combinations of foods I love and avocado is a great addition to any salad 🙂
I used jalapeno cornbread in my last panzanella also! The spice adds such a nice twist.
I love this, and not just because I am slightly addicted to cornbread. I blogged about some chili cheddar corn muffins that would be perfect in this. I’d probably toss in some black beans in too! Yum!
I’m sure this tastes as wonderful as it looks. Going to gather these ingredients this week and devour!!
Wow, this looks so good! I love panzanella and this is such a fun take on it.
This is such a fun spin on classic panzanella! I’m craving a giant bowl right now.
This looks fantastic, Maria and Josh! Love that kick of spice!
Oh my\, that looks amazing! Love the mini cornbreads! Just pinned!
Panzanella is one of my all time favorites!! I don’t think I’d be able to stop eating this once I started!
I’ve got a bunch of freshly roasted Hatch chiles I picked up at the grocery store down the road–I think they’d sub in nicely for jalapeño. I’m so glad you showed the step of toasting the cubes of cornbread–that’s brilliant, and something I’d never thought of. I just use leftover cornbread that’s a day old and a bit drier, but toasting sounds even better to me.
Thanks, Maria!
Ooooo…that looks so super tasty!!
Grilled corn bread is a great addition to so many things. Great switch up for a panzanella salad.
I made this a few nights ago and it was fantastic! All the flavors were great together and I was definitely glad I made the cornbread from scratch. I ended up using a serrano because our grocery store was out of jalapenos and I think that probably gave it even more flavor. The only downside was the amount of time it took for the cornbread to cool before I could cut it into cubes and toast it in the oven. Next time around I would probably make that the night before so I could cut it right when I am making the rest of the salad. Thanks for sharing a great recipe!
Hi – I made this salad recently and loved it! Thanks for the great recipe.
Salad is very suitable our life. But i like pineapple salad.
My goodness – this looks ridiculously good. Love the idea of adding cornbread into a panzanella. YUM!
I just love a good bread salad and this looks like such an amazing variation on it!
Wondering about the corn in the corn bread, fresh but not cooked?