Here’s a quick recipe for a caprese salad as we move from summer into fall, much more slowly here in SE Texas than for those of you in more northerly climates. Even though it’s late September, we can still get fresh, just-picked tomatoes at our farmers market and our basil plants are still producing, which are the upsides of the lingering heat. Even though it’s a rainy day, today’s high temperature was 91℉/33℃, so it’s a little hard to get on the fall recipes bandwagon just yet.
This caprese salad is fresh, deeply satisfying and light, just the right thing for a late-summer / early fall first course. Or in any season, really, if you can get ripe tomatoes.
Easy Caprese Salad
Serves 2; cooking time: 10 minutes
Ingredients
- ¼ cup of red onion, sliced and then chopped into ~1 inch pieces
- 1 cup of grape tomatoes, halved (about 20-25)
- ¼ cup chopped or torn fresh basil
- ½ cup fresh mozzarella, in bite-sized pieces (I use mozzarella pearls)
- Handful of fresh Bibb or butter lettuce
- Salt and freshly-ground pepper, to taste
- 1 tbsp or more good-quality balsamic vinegar
- 1 tsp or more extra-virgin olive oil
Instructions
Combine ¼ cup red onion, cup of grape tomatoes, ¼ cup basil and ½ cup fresh mozzarella in a bowl and stir. Add a pinch of salt and about ten turns of freshly ground pepper. Cover two salad plates with lettuce leaves, then distribute the salad evenly over them. Drizzle with oil and vinegar and serve.
Notes
- Amounts in this recipe are suggestions only – you can add more or less of each and still have a fabulous salad.
- This salad a great starter salad for a dinner party; you can make it ahead and dress it right before serving.
- Red onion and balsamic vinegar aren’t traditional ingredients for a caprese salad, but they sure are good!
- Don’t skip the lettuce, because it looks pretty and tastes great. You can use any greens you have on hand, such as spinach or arugula.
- There usually aren’t leftovers, but if you do somehow fail to eat it all, this salad would be great the next day in a spinach wrap.
- This recipe doesn’t use as much olive oil as a traditional caprese, making it lighter. Just add more if you prefer.
- We love love love to play with flavor-infused olive oils and balsamic vinegars, and one of our favorite balsamic flavors to use in this recipe is dark cherry, which has a deep sweetness and works really well with the herbaceous woodiness of basil.
Join Me in the Kitchen
I love how these ingredients look in my blue mixing bowl.
Autumn Starts Tomorrow
The first day of fall is September 22 this year, at least for the northern hemisphere. It will probably be another month before we have any true fall weather, but it will be very, very welcome when it comes. What are you cooking as the seasons turn? Have you dusted off those cool-weather recipes, or are you doing the Last Dance of Summer, like us?
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