Tricolore Salad

Our friend Aniko introduced us to one of our favorite "Italian" dishes: the so called Tricolore Salad with tomatoes, mozzarella, basil and avocado. I guess you can't really call this an Italian salad, because of the avocados, but it's probably adapted from a basic Italian salad, the Mozzarella Caprese, and you can find it in some Italian Cookbooks, too. For the past six years or so, we've served this salad at least once a week for dinner, with or without a soup as starter.

This is a very simple recipe, with only a few ingredients, and it's success lies in the quality of the ingredients.

What you need:
2-3 campari tomatoes per person, sliced
1-1.5 fresh mozzarella bocconcini (bite size mozzarella), sliced
1/4 avocado per person, sliced
2-3 basil leaves per person
1 tablespoon top quality olive oil per serving
1 teaspoon top quality balsamic vinegar (optional) per serving
sea salt
black pepper
fresh ciabatta rolls


Preparation:

Place tomato slices on a plate, sprinkle with salt and freshly ground pepper. For this salad I would use some courser sea salt, it brings out the flavor of the tomatoes better. Also, ideally at this stage you should leave the salted tomatoes rest for 20 minutes, half an our, so the tomatoes would release their juices. I don't usually have time for this step, but the salad is still very flavorful without it, too. Until you finish putting the salad together, the tomatoes will release enough of their juices.

  

After 20 minutes, put one slice of mozzarella on each tomato slice, then top it with a slice of avocado. Garnish with basil leaves, drizzle with olive oil and (optionally) with balsamic vinegar. We usually serve this salad without the vinegar, it's a question of personal preference. Serve it with very fresh ciabatta bread and black or green olives (also optional). My husband, Peter likes some red pesto with it, that is not an option for me because of the dry rosemary.

If your ciabatta bread is not very  fresh, here's a trick I learned in communist Romania 25 years ago, when fresh bread wasn't always available. Pat down the uncut day old ciabatta rolls with your wet hands, until they're slightly wet all over, then bake the rolls in the preheated oven at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 10 minutes. They will come out fresh and crispy. I do this even with fresh ciabatta bought in the morning, there's nothing like the warm, crisp crusted ciabatta for mopping up the juices from the plate. Enjoy!