Caprese salad with a twist.

It is the strawberry season and since I missed the picking last year, I decided to make up for it this time around.  I can’t help myself; I get caught up in the picking experience.  I can do it for hours, kneeling on the patch, stuffing my face with perfectly ripe, still hot from the sun strawberries, one for me… and one for the box… As always, I over picked, grossly….and even after making a batch of jam ( which I will post very soon) I have a lot of strawberries left, which means it is time to get creative.    This is the recipe inspired by one very similar in the “Around my French table” book.  Adding strawberries to a caprese salad seems strange as strawberries and tomatoes never cross seasons, so at least one of them would be less than stellar…but I got lucky, I happened on very good buffalo mozzarella, some very decent heirloom tomatoes (actually local but from a greenhouse), I just planted my own basil and could already spare a few leaves and of course the strawberries were perfect.   Try it, the combination is unusual but interesting, and makes a very good snack or an appetizer…

Strawberry Caprese salad.

Traditional Cparese salad is made with buffalo mozzarella but regular cow-milk fresh pulled cheese is good as well.  I also like mild goat cheese here for a very different twist…

Good quality, very ripe tomatoes cut into thick slices

Fresh buffalo mozzarella cut into slices

Fresh basil either chopped or torn

Fresh strawberries sliced

Lemon zest

Salt

Fresh Pepper

Extra Virgin olive oil

Toss the strawberries, lemon zest and half of black pepper, let stand a few minutes.  Assemble the salad by stacking tomatoes, mozzarella and basil.  Add strawberries on top of the basil.  Drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and black pepper.