Insalata Caprese by bananna fish

For my first recipe, I decided to make Insalata Caprese because I was stressed out about an interview (I got the job) and wanted some delicious and quick italian food. Insalata Caprese is an absolutely delicious and completely Italian salad that has only three ingredients when it is in it's purest form. Unfortunately, I didn't have my nice olive oil, so I decided to spice it up a bit and add a few new ingredients, bringing my own twist to the table in the form of balsamic.

First, the goods.

Ingredients

Olive Oil Balsamic Vinegar, the older, the more expensive, the better, just like wine. Mine was a cheapy like $13 bottle, not at all ideal. fresh, handpicked, still warm from the sun cherry tomatoes fresh italian basil (which is in an oregeno box) and a smidge of parsley, which was a mistake, so act like I didn't put it in there mozzarella - the ratio of little mozzarella balls to tomatoes should be 1:1.75 very precise. not at all.

Method

Make sure you get the GOOD STUFF SOAKED IN VINEGAR AND WATER, NOT CRAP FROM A BAG - stuff like this: very easy to find at Trader Joe's, very cheap, like $5 for the entire container and well worth it

So, slice the tomatoes in half. It is easy to do, so I didn't need to take a picture of it. Now drain the the cheese and dump the two things together in a glass bowl. The glass bowl is very important, as a metal or plastic bowl will change the flavors.

Now strip the basil. You can do this easily by putting your fingertips at the small end of the stick and pull! Pull! Pull! Now all the leaves should come off. It's really easy. This basil is weird. It was called something else, but I think that is because it's organic, and people don't know what they're talking about a lot, myself included. okay, anyway. Make a pile about this size:

and then chop it a little, not into tiny tiny pieces, but enough to break the leaves and release the delicious flavor and wonderful scent. At this point in my recipe I added some Italian Parsley, which was a mistake and I picked it all out after my first bite, so let's act like I didn't do that to begin with.

Now for the oil! Typically, oil is the most important part of the salad, but since I can't find my fancy oil, I am using my roommate's crap like Kroger brand bullshit olive oil. Anyway, add about 1.5oz

Now drizzle that over the tomatoes, cheese, and basil. Typically, you would be done, but since it's cheap olive oil, I'm added some almost equally cheap balsamic vinegar. oh god I love balsamic. Add about .5oz of that to the salad.

Gently stir

And you get

Now you seem cultured and fancy! Eat this pretty much right away, although it can be really really really good when it is ice cold and has been "brewing" for a few hours. Never let it sit for more than a day, or it will get slimey and gross.