Tomato cheese panini

tomato-panini
I had mentioned about my love for the panini at panera bread. I had to try making it at home. I had mentioned in the above mentioned post that I had frozen 1/3rd of the dough. So, yesterday night for dinner, I made these paninis. Since the bread was just out of oven, these were crispy and very very tasty. I think I will make this often now. This is not exactly same as panera bread version, but was definitely very good.

Ingredients:
Small loaf of bread(any bread will do)
Mozzerella cheese
Few tomato slices
Sun dried tomato pesto :
1/4 cup sun dried tomatoes
1 tea spn freshly chopped garlic
1/4 tea spn chilli flakes
1/2 tea spn dried basil
Salt

Method:
Grind the pesto ingredients (do not add water, if necessary, add olive oil).
Cut the loaf horizontally. Spread the pesto on one side.
tomato-panini1
Keep fresh tomato slice on it. Then spread mozzerella cheese.
tomato-panini2
Cover with the second half.
tomato-panini3
Grill it in panini press or on a normal grill(Keep the bread on grill and keep a heavy weight on top) till it gets marks from both sides.
tomato-panini4
Serve hot.

PS: Fresh basil works better than dried one in this. If you can find it, add the chopped leaves to panini instead of including it in pesto.
For melting the cheese faster, broil it in oven for few minutes and then grill.
The quantity of all the ingredients is not mentioned as it is a mix and match dish.

16 thoughts on “Tomato cheese panini”

  1. Wow.. the description + photos is mouthwatering! Crisp bread n filling..yumm..I loved the last photo, I often do this to cook my curry in a deep kadhai where the lid is illfitting to avoid steam frm escaping 😀 Lovely recipe, tks for sharing! Hv a gr8 wkend.

  2. This post has inspired me Shilpa. Now I know what I’m having for lunch, am making it as soon as I finish typing this comment. Will be using store-bought artisan bread though. Btw, your olive loaf can give Panera bread a run for its money, it looks so good.

  3. I love tomato-mozzarella-basil combination in salads and sandwiches.. I’ve been thinking of buying a panini press for a while, I also use a makeshift panini press just like you’ve done here… 🙂

  4. Please let me know which sundried tomatoes we need to use.I bought which we get in packet and are dry ,the others are bottled and marinated in vinegar and oil.It would be great if you could give me the name of the brand which you used.

    Shilpa: You can use any sundried tomatoes. I have used different ones and all work good.

  5. Shilpa, this looks yummy. I will try this tomorrow for lunch. If you are wondering why I am a daily visitor of your website then to let you know, I am preggo with my 2nd baby so now a days, all I do is look for food and eat it, LOL…I will try baking some bread from your recipe too.

  6. This looks great!!!!!!!!! we ate humus and spinich panini in us and we loved it so much that now back in uk i try to make all the types of panini with all the diffrent ingridiants. i well try this too.

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