Insalata Caprese

We eat a lot of salads, usually as a side with dinner but sometimes as a full meal for lunch.  I love discovering the various salad offerings at buffets and salad bars.  The word salad often brings to mind the generic garden salad consisting of iceberg lettuce, tomato, and cucumber topped with an equally generic salad dressing (eg. Thousand Island, house).  However, salad need not be boring or generic.  There are so many salads to discover.

The salad section of the buffet at the Golden Nugget Hotel and Casino offers all of the ingredients for making your own garden or Caesar salads.  There is also a lovely offering of ready to serve salads.  I chose a colourful vegetable packed mixed salad (top) and insalata caprese (bottom right).  Insalata caprese is a salad made in the style of Capri.  It consists of tomatoes, buffalo mozzarella cheese, basil and olive oil, seasoned with salt and pepper.  Insalata caprese is usually served as a starter rather than a side dish.

This is a very easy salad to make at home.  The version pictured had the buffalo mozzarella cheese shaped to mimic the grape tomatoes however the most popular presentation is tomato slices topped with freshly sliced mozzarella cheese, topped with a drizzle of olive oil then garnished with fresh basil leaves.  Another pretty presentation is to alternate the tomato and mozzarella slices ring fashion on a plate then drizzle with olive oil and garnish with fresh basil leaves.  It is one of our favourite salads when the garden is laden with tomatoes.