Caprese Salad

As most of my friends know, one of my favorite restaurants in Fort Worth is Taverna. They make this incredible caprese salad with red and yellow grape tomatoes, and since I've moved I was having a serious craving for it. I had grand plans to use my cherry tomatoes grown in my very own herb garden, until I woke up the next morning and discovered that all my beautiful ripe tomatoes had split skins. According to the internet, it was caused by the monsoon rainstorm that hit us the day before. This made me sad, but I had a backup plan of going to a local farmers market and picking up fresh tomatoes there. When THAT market was closed after work, I gave up and settled for the prettiest tomatoes I could find at the local grocery store. I had to have my caprese salad! Steamy Kitchen had a delicious-looking recipe so I went with big tomatoes rather than the cherry ones.

Steamy Kitchen's gorgeous photo of her salad:

What mine ended up looking like:

Ok, so my presentation skills need some work. But it tasted delicious! Steamy Kitchen has fantastic step-by-step instructions here, so I won't attempt to reproduce them. This recipe only works with FRESH tomatoes and basil so do it while they're still around!