Sweet tomatoes are in season right now and if you've got old bread or pitta going stale, fattoush is a great way to use both in a refreshing summer salad. Change the lettuce to what you have in the garden. I recently made it with chicory which gave it a nice bitter element.

Fattoush is a Levantine salad packed with fresh herbs, traditionally made to use up older bread. It has a sour punch from sumac and lemon dressing and is spiced with zataar, an aromatic Middle Eastern spice blend. It's pretty easy to buy zataar these days, thanks to the recent popularity of Middle Eastern food, but you can make it yourself.

Fattoush Salad

Serves: 2 | Dietary: Vegan

Ingredients:

• 2 little gem lettuces thickly shredded
• 1/2 cucumber, diced
• 4 spring onions, sliced
• 12 cherry tomatoes, halved
• handful of flat parsley, roughly chopped
• handful of mint, roughly, chopped
• 2 pitta or lavash breads

Dressing:

• 3 garlic cloves, finely chopped
• 3 tbsps extra virgin olive oil
• juice of one lemon
• 1 tsp sumac
• 1 tsp zataar
• salt and freshly ground black pepper

Method:

1. Mix all the vegetables and herbs together in a salad bowl.
2. Make up the dressing and pour over the salad.
3. Split the pitta breads, open them out and toast until crisp. Then break them up into bite-sized pieces.
4. Mix the toasted pitta into the salad and serve at once, before the pitta goes soggy.