Dalai Mama Dishes

by Catherine Newman

Catherine Newman cooks for the family

Dalai Mama Dishes

Catherine Newman cooks for the family

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Tomatoes, Basil, and Mozzarella

Posted August 23, 2010
Find more about salad , mozzarella , basil , tomatoes
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Tomatoes, basil, and mozzarella.

Clearly, this is not a difficult meal to put together.

And yet I seem to have taken so many pictures of Michael making it! Maybe it's because I like his hands so much.

Because I know you don't need to see someone slicing tomatoes to understand how to slice tomatoes.

Or salting them.

Or slicing mozzarella (not that I personally would have used a serrated knife for this, by the way, even if the serrated knife I'd used to slice the tomatoes was still sitting handily on the cutting board. . . )

Michael wanted me to tell you something about this olive oil step, but I forgot what it was.

Oh, it's that he used to brush it on with a pastry brush but now he spoons it. I hope that's useful information. (Just kidding: it's not.)

Here's Ben's special plate.

And Ben eating it. Long hair, right? I asked him recently if he was sick of strangers commenting to me about my beautiful daughters, and he said, "Oh god, please. I don't care." That's my boy! Love that kid.

Did you want to see a closer-up shot of the bouquet Michael picked? Oh, Michael!

Or of the bottom half of Michael's face?

Or of Birdy's pajamas matching her dinner? Good.

The end of the summer almost always coincides with what is more or less the end of cooking for me. It's like it dwindles through June and July, dwindles, dwindles, dwindles, and I'm making more and more salads, more and more grilled this and that, turning the stove on less and less. And then come August, I'm reduced to meals like this: raw tomatoes, basil, and fresh mozzarella, with crusty bread that I didn't even bake because I'm so not planning to turn the oven on. Maybe I'll bring a pot of water to a boil and do my famous 3-minute corn on the cob. Maybe. But that's it. Because I don't feel like cooking, and the produce is abundant and gorgeous right now, the herbs fresh and fragrant, and secretly I'm always waiting for someone to invite us to dinner at the last possible second. Come 6:30, I say to Michael, "Do you think anyone's going to invite us to dinner tonight?" and he says, "Maybe!"

But if they don't, then we can eat this--even though the fresh mozzarella is expensive (though not so expensive if you get it at Trader Joe's and if you remind yourself that it's dinner). Did I ever tell you about my phase of making mozzarella? I know. A friend and I took this class and bought this book and I made mozzarella nonstop for months, bringing ginormous gallons of whole milk to a steaming something-or-other on the instant-read thermometer, stirring in spoonfuls of citric acid and drops of rennet, burning my hands on the warm, stretchy curds that turned into magic and magically huge logs of the best fresh mozzarella I'd ever eaten. So warm and buttery that it tasted almost like lobster to me--not fishy, just so wildly milky-rich. I loved it. Only then this one summer, every time I made it, it came out like a wad of dry curds--I just couldn't understand it. It never got stretchy or soft, and it was tasty enough, but so diminished in its magnificence that I was heartbroken. And it turned out that the bag I thought was full of citric acid was actually full of kosher salt. Seriously. And for some reason I still haven't gotten back in the habit of making it.

So. Boughten mozzarella, so be it. Ben eats a peach or something alongside his tomato-less tomatoes, basil, and mozzarella--and honestly, sometimes when I'm cutting tomatoes? And those jellied-eyeball seeds squeeze out all over the cutting board? I really get where he's coming from at a tomato hater.

And of course, because children's tastes can be almost perversely divergent, this is Birdy's favorite meal in the whole world. She can even spot "Caprese Salad" on a restaurant menu, and will always order it and always be happy when it comes. Usually, if there's such a nice thing to order, it means we're out to dinner with my parents, who laugh when Birdy disappears behind the gigantic menu, laugh when she places her order, and then laugh again when she mops up the last droplets of juice and oil with a dinner roll, sighs, and says, "I ordered the perfect thing."

Tomatoes, Basil, and Mozzarella
Serves 4 for dinner or 8 as an appetizer
Total time: 10 minutes

If you don't have great tomatoes, good mozzarella, and fresh basil, then I don't think this actually worth making. In a pinch, Polly-O whole-milk mozzarella, which is not fresh, works, I think. But it has to be that exact kind of that exact brand, and anyway Michael disagrees with me about it so it's probably best to go with fresh.

2-3 large tomatoes
Kosher salt
12 ounces fresh mozzarella
2 tablespoons olive oil
Fresh basil leaves

Slice the tomatoes and lay them out on a platter. Salt them generously. Slice the mozzarella similarly, and lay the slices on the tomatoes. Drizzle with the olive oil, then top each piece with a large, fresh leaf of basil and serve.

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About Catherine Newman

Catherine Newman is the author of the memoir, Waiting for Birdy: A Year of Frantic Tedium, Neurotic Angst, and the Wild Magic of Growing a Family, available online and in bookstores nationwide.

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