Tomato, Mozzarella and Pesto Salad

Himself and I tied the knot! I married my bestfriend surrounded by our families and friends and it was a truly perfect day. There will be a wedding blog in the near future, but for now, we’re enjoying letting those memories settle between ourselves.

So today I have a little recipe post for you!

This is an extremely simple dish that can be a main course, a side dish or a lovely snack, so it’s a win all round from me! I wholly recommend making pesto from scratch, it gives an incredibly “I’m sitting in Barcelona with the sun on my face” kind of taste but if you’re short on time buy one from the fresh pasta fridge section, it’s the next best option – stay away from the jars in your larder!

Ingredients (enough for two people to share as a main course)

Pesto

• Basil plant
• 50g raw pine nuts
• 1/2 cup grated parmesan
• 1 small-medium sized clove of garlic
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• A large pinch of salt
• 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar

Salad

• 5 large vine tomatoes (or 3 Beef tomatoes)
• 1 mozzarella pillow

Directions

Tear off all the leaves on your basil plant (I like to have a couple of the stems in there too as they really strengthen the flavour), then throw in the pine nuts, parmesan, peeled and roughly chopped clove of garlic, olive oil and salt to your food processor and blitz to your hearts content!

Dole out two spoonfuls of your delicious pesto into a separate bowl – marvel at it in all it’s green gorgeousness

Then slowly add your balsamic vinegar (to taste – I used a 1/4 cup), this gives it a lovely zingy kick!

Stir until combined and then set aside in the fridge. Thinly slice your tomatoes and pile them up on a serving dish, take your pillow of mozzarella and then either slice this finely too, or – like I did – scoop out from the main pillow and make little balls and dot them around your plate

Don’t you want to just take a little nap on it?….just me? Surely not! zzzzzzZZZZZZZZZZZZ

As you can see I did not have a melon baller, but I gave it a good try with the help of my tsp measures! Anyway, this dish is very much all about taste rather than design!

Spoon out generous dollops of your sauce and serve with thick doorstep bread – no one will be able to resist mopping up that luscious sauce!

My preference is to enjoy this with a perfectly chilled glass of white wine, outside, soaking up some vitamin D and getting in some good chat in the process!

nom nom nom nom NOMMY NOM NOM!!

Enjoy!

Rxx