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1
Warm the olive oil in a wide, heavy pot over moderate heat. Add the garlic and cook until it turns pale gold and the kitchen carries a steady, sweet fragrance — do not allow it to brown.
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2
Add the crushed tomatoes with all their liquid. Season with salt. Cook uncovered, stirring occasionally, until the tomatoes have broken down completely into a dense, brick-red sauce and no watery liquid remains at the surface — the sauce should hold a channel when a spoon is drawn through it.
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3
Add the water or light broth and bring the pot to a steady simmer.
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4
Add all the torn stale pane sciocco at once, pressing the pieces beneath the surface. This is where the dish lives or dies: the bread must be genuinely stale (3–5 days) and Tuscan unsalted — salted bread will not dissolve cleanly, and fresh bread will turn gluey. Stir vigorously and frequently over moderate heat until every piece of bread has fully dissolved into the tomato, leaving no distinct chunks — the soup becomes a single, unified, porridge-like mass that the Tuscans call pappa.
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5
Continue cooking, stirring, until the soup is thick enough that a ladle lifted and tilted holds a mound of pappa that does not run — if it pours freely, cook further. Adjust salt with care.
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6
Remove from the heat. Remove and discard the garlic cloves. Serve warm in autumn or at room temperature in summer: ladle into bowls, drizzle generously with raw Tuscan extra-virgin olive oil, scatter torn fresh basil over the surface, and finish with coarsely ground black pepper. The basil is added at service only — heat destroys its volatile aromatics.