Italians love mozzarella and add it to different dishes. Without this cheese it is impossible to imagine Margherita pizza and Caprese salad, which are among the recognized masterpieces of Italian cuisine. However, snacks, where there are tender mozzarella and juicy tomatoes, there is much more. These products perfectly complement each other, making up a colorful and tasty duet. Supplemented with other ingredients, they allow you to get new versions of dishes that almost everyone likes. Salads with mozzarella and tomatoes are the hallmark of Mediterranean cuisine, and there are many different recipes for them. Among them you will find options suitable for a family dinner and for a holiday table, light and satisfying.
Cooking Features
The process of making salads from tomatoes and mozzarella depends on the specific recipe, but it is not complicated. Even an inexperienced chef will do an excellent job if he knows a few subtleties.
- The quality of the products from which the salad is prepared fundamentally affects its taste. From stale cheese and watery tomatoes you can not make a delicious snack. No sauce will mask the unpleasant aroma, will not make fresh products juicy and tasty. Always pay attention to the composition of the cheese, the place of its production, shelf life. Good mozzarella is white, friable, has no sour taste and smell. Tomatoes choose ripe, fleshy and preferably ground.
- If you like cheese and tomato dishes, you should get knives made especially for cutting them. With their help, you will cut mozzarella in even cubes or plates, and when chopping tomatoes you will not squeeze the juice out of them.
- Salads with mozzarella and tomatoes are salted in a minimal amount and only at the last moment. Otherwise, the juice from the tomatoes will quickly be on the plate, which will affect both the taste and the appearance of the snack. It is also recommended to fill the appetizer with sauce just before serving it to the table.
Mozzarella and tomatoes complement each other so well that they will be good and without additional ingredients, it will be enough to fill them with sauce. Introduction to the composition of the salad of other products allows you to get new tastes, spice up the snack, making it even more juicy and fragrant. These ingredients combine well with any greens and lettuce leaves, pasta and seafood, chicken breast and ham, eggs and cucumbers.
Caprese Salad
Composition:
- tomatoes - 0, 3 kg;
- mozzarella - 0, 2 kg;
- fresh basil (green) - 30-40 g;
- olive oil - 60 ml;
- salt (optional) - to taste;
- balsamic vinegar - 5 ml.
Method of preparation:
- Wash the tomatoes, dry them with a napkin, cut them into circles about 3-5 mm thick.
- Wash, shake basil from water, let it dry. Tear off the leaves of the stems - you only need them.
- Remove mozzarella from brine (or just out of the package if you purchased the product without brine), cut it into slices.
- Spread on a dish, alternating tomatoes, cheese and basil leaves. Leave the remaining leaves in the center of the dish.
- In a small container, combine the oil and balsamic vinegar, if desired, add a little salt. Whisk the products with a whisk. Pour over mozzarella, tomatoes and basil with the resulting dressing.
Italians love this salad and are proud of it. The colors of the products present in the appetizer symbolize the colors of the Italian flag. Additionally, the salad can be sprinkled with pine nuts.
Salad with mozzarella, cherry tomatoes and arugula
Composition:
- arugula - 100 g;
- cherry tomatoes - 0, 25 kg;
- mozzarella - 0, 3 kg;
- Italian herbs - to taste;
- sesame seeds - to taste;
- olive oil - 60 ml;
- balsamic vinegar - 40 ml.
Method of preparation:
- Wash arugula. When it is dry, tear it with your hands and place it in a bowl.
- Wash, dry the tomatoes with a napkin, cut them in half, put them in a bowl of arugula.
- Mix balsamic vinegar with olive oil, pour half the mixture into arugula and tomatoes, mix them carefully and place on a dish.
- Smash mozzarella balls with your hands, spread them on top, pour the remaining dressing.
- Fry the sesame seeds in a dry frying pan until a nutty smell appears.
- Sprinkle the salad with dried herbs and sesame.
Arugula and sesame give a salad made according to this recipe, nutty and mustard notes, its taste is unique.
Salad with mozzarella, tomatoes, cucumbers and chicken
Composition:
- leaf lettuce - 100 g;
- cucumbers - 0, 2 kg;
- tomatoes - 0, 3 kg;
- red onion - 100 g;
- chicken breast fillet - 0, 2 kg;
- pitted olives - 100 g;
- mozzarella - 120 g;
- olive oil, salt, spices - to taste.
Method of preparation:
- Boil chicken fillet in salted water, cool.
- Wash tomatoes, blot with a napkin, cut into large cubes.
- Wash cucumbers, cut off their tips. Slice the vegetables into slices like tomatoes, put them in a deep bowl with them.
- Cut the chicken fillet into small cubes, add to the other ingredients.
- Free the onions from the husk. Cut it into thin half rings or quarter rings if the bulb is large. Send to other vegetables.
- Wash the salad, let it dry, tear it into pieces and mix it with the ingredients in a bowl.
- Cut the olives in halves, add to the other components.
- Mix butter with salt and pepper, season it with a snack. Leave some dressing for watering the finished dish.
- Put the salad on a large plate or salad bowl.
- Slice the mozzarella and spread on the surface of the salad, pour the remaining oil.
This variant of mozzarella and tomato salad belongs to Greek cuisine. If to exclude chicken breast from the composition of the snack, it will become less nourishing, but it will remain as tasty.
Salad with mozzarella, tomatoes and egg
Composition:
- mozzarella - 0, 2 kg;
- lettuce leaves - 50 g;
- tomatoes - 0, 3 kg;
- chicken egg - 4 pcs .;
- pitted olives - 100 g;
- lemon - 0, 5 pcs .;
- olive oil - 80 ml;
- Dijon mustard - 20 ml;
- salt - to taste.
Method of preparation:
- Tear lettuce leaves, put on a dish.
- In a small container, place the mustard, squeeze the juice from half a lemon on it, rub it with a fork.
- Add butter to mustard and lemon juice, whisk with a whisk to make the sauce have a uniform consistency.
- Boil chicken eggs, put them under a stream of cold water, so that they cool down faster and are easy to clean.
- Remove the eggshell from the eggs, cut them into cubes of medium size.
- Wash, dry the tomatoes with a napkin. Cut them into approximately the same cubes as the eggs.
- Cut the olives in two.
- Cut half the cheese into small cubes, cut the remaining mozzarella into plates.
- Salad leaves pour a spoonful of the sauce.
- In a bowl, combine diced mozzarella, eggs, tomatoes, and olives. Pour in three quarters of the sauce, stir gently, put on a dish with lettuce leaves.
- Spread mozzarella plates on top of the appetizer, pour the remaining sauce.
Salad made according to the above recipe is nourishing, but not heavy. It has a savory, but balanced taste. The appetizer will look even more appetizing if cherry tomatoes and quail eggs are used to make it. Cut these products in halves.
How to decorate a salad with mozzarella and tomatoes
The contrasting combination of white mozzarella and red tomatoes makes the appetizer of them bright without additional design. However, there are many options for decorating salads with mozzarella and tomatoes, which should be used when serving dishes to the table.
- Cherry tomatoes are often used to make salad. If they are cut into halves and spread out on the edge of the plate, the salad will get a neater appearance. Olives and olives can be used in the same way.
- A beautifully mozzarella and tomato salad looks like if you put it not on a clean dish, but on a piece of lettuce filled with leaves, whole or torn to shreds. This simple method of decorating snacks can be used with its serving.
- Freshness of lettuce is emphasized by ladybugs made from halved tomatoes. The spots and their heads are made from pieces of olives.
- If ordinary tomatoes are used for cooking, it’s better to choose medium-sized ones so that you can cut them into circles. The same circles can be cut into cheese, eggs, cucumbers, then spread them out on a platter, alternating in any order. This way of serving is traditional for many Mediterranean dishes, including the popular “Caprese” salad.
Flowers from vegetables will also be a good decor for a mozzarella and tomato salad.
Mediterranean cuisine is impossible to imagine without tomato and mozzarella salads. Their fresh and balanced taste is pleasant to many. Such snacks are nourishing and healthy, but they are not among the dishes heavy for the stomach. They can include in the diet even people who are on a diet.
