Dukkah Baked Feta and Cucumber Bread Salad

This recipe started with a question—what to do with the last bit of a sesame loaf from Brickmaiden Bread? Bread salad!

We took a cue from the seeded bread and reached for Bodega Trading Co.’s dukkah to flavor the toasted bread. Hailing from Egypt, dukkah is a mix of sesame seeds, spices, and finely chopped nuts. The exact mix varies. Bodega Trading Co.’s is a mix of cashews, pistachios, sea salt, sesame seeds, cumin, black pepper, mint, and coriander.

The spiced, toasted bread is tossed with a cucumber and onion salad. The variety of cucumbers at the market in June is really fantastic. Shop around for a few varieties to maximize this salad, but if you’ve only got a single kind, that totally works too. Toss the toasted bread with the salad to soak up the flavors.

The star of the show, however, is a baked wedge of Tomales Farmstead Creamery’s Greco, a feta-style cheese. We’ve sprinkled over more dukkah and baked it just long enough to warm through without totally melting. Place it on top of the salad, and you’ve got a dish that no one would believe started with a two-day old hunk of bread.

Ingredients and Producers

4 ounces day old sesame loaf- $2.50, Brickmaiden Breads

5 tablespoons olive oil, divided

3 teaspoons dukkah mix- Bodega Trading Co., $3

1 pound mixed cucumbers - $4, Star Route Farms

1 spring red onion - $.75

1 3 ounce package Greco cheese (or another feta-style cheese) - Tomales Farmstead Creamery, $15 Tomales Farms

1 lemon, $1

2 tablespoons chopped mint, $.50 Zarate Family Farm

Salt and pepper

Directions  

Preheat the oven to 375°F.

 Tear 4 ounces of bread into bite sized pieces. Add to a small sheet pan. Drizzle with 1 tablespoon olive oil and toss to coat. Sprinkle over 2 teaspoons dukkah and salt and pepper, tossing to coat. Bake for 15 minutes, stirring halfway through. Bread should be dried out, but does not need to be crouton-hard.

 Meanwhile, cut 1 pound of cucumbers. A mix of different shapes and sizes provides nice variety. Thinly slice 1 spring red onion. Add to a bowl and toss with 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt. Pour the cucumbers into a strainer and set over the bowl. This pulls some of the water out of the cucumbers and softens the onion.

 Remove the bread from the oven and set aside. Increase the oven temperature to 400°F.

 Place the feta in a small ovenproof dish or skillet. Drizzle over 1 teaspoon of olive oil and shake over 1 teaspoon dukkah. Place in oven and bake for 10 minutes. The cheese should be soft but not melted.

 Meanwhile, chop 1 tablespoon mint. Pour out any water in the cucumber bowl. Add the cucumbers back to the bowl. Pour over remaining 4 tablespoons olive oil and the juice of one lemon. Toss to coat. Add the bread pieces and the mint, toss until well combined. Taste and season with additional salt and pepper as desired. Transfer the salad to a platter or large, shallow bowl for serving.

 When the cheese is done, use a spatula to place on top of the salad. Serve immediately.

Enjoy!

Recipe by Meleyna Nomura