Heirloom Tomato Salad with Burrata

2023-05-25

This Heirloom Tomato Salad with Burrata is one of the easiest, most impressive dishes of the summer! It's restaurant-quality and visitor perfect while stuff a no-fuss, 15 minute or less recipe thanks to juicy, showy heirloom tomatoes and linty burrata cheese. The bonus is that is goes with just well-nigh everything from crusty specie (for sopping up those succulent juices) to grilled meats!

We squint forward to summer-fresh tomatoes all year long! Whether they are from your garden or the farmer's market, they are one of our favorite things well-nigh the summer season. Some of our other favorite tomato recipes are Southern Tomato Pie, Caprese Salad, Fried Untried Tomatoes, and Easy Tomato Basil Bruschetta.

a tropical image of heirloom tomato salad with burrata cheese on a serving plate

If you have never tried heirloom tomatoes, you are in for a real treat! Not only are they gorgeous orbs coming in all colors, shapes, and sizes from yellow to untried to red and brown, they moreover have a wonderfully complex, rich savor that makes them perfect for showcasing in their fresh, natural state with very little uneaten preparation.

Hence this delightfully simple but sophisticated heirloom tomato salad! It's bursting with summer goodness and honestly so satisfying that we have been known to make a meal of just this salad, served family style on a large platter, with plenty of crusty specie on the side.

But it's just as good with grilled steaks, fried chicken, or pan-seared salmon if you are looking for something a little increasingly substantial.

a white plate with a serving of fresh heirloom tomatoes, burrata cheese, and a simple dressing

If you can't find burrata cheese, the salad is succulent on it's own without it or with flipside soft cheese like feta or goat cheese instead. But burrata is incredible stuff and it's worth the uneaten effort to locate it, usually in the deli section, at your local grocery store.

What are heirloom tomatoes?

Heirloom tomatoes are often lumpy, multi-colored tomatoes that are noticeably variegated from the round, uniformly red tomatoes you see the rest of the year round. Their name isn't just a marketing ploy; it's unquestionably descriptive of what they unquestionably are, which is an heirloom variety of tomato that hasn't been cross-bread or modified for increasingly than 40 years.

The savor of heirloom tomatoes tends to be much increasingly intense than regular tomatoes, which sometimes seem watery and just not as spectacular when eaten side-by-side. Granted, each variety of heirloom tomato has it's own unique taste and texture, so you might want to get a few variegated kinds to learn which you like best.

a large white platter filled with a simple heirloom tomato salad

Recipe Ingredients

Heirloom tomatoes: You can use any heirloom tomatoes you like - there are dozens of varieties and I don't pretend to know the names and differences between them all. Personally, I like to go for a mix of colors and flavors, waffly it up every time. The brown ones tend to be my personal favorites, although you really can't go wrong.
Fresh basil: If the leaves are small, just pluck them off the stem whole and sprinkle them over the salad. If they are large, you may want to stack them, then roll into a cigar and thinly slice them into ribbons (a technique known as "chiffonade").
Burrata cheese: This glorious cheese is closely related to fresh mozzarella, but it's softer, creamier, and sweeter. It comes in a wittiness in a tub of water and can be found in the deli section of most stores.
Red onion & garlic: These are lesser players in this dish but add a wonderful zest to the salad.
Oil & vinegar: This is as vital as dressing a salad gets so be sure to use good quality uneaten virgin olive oil and red wine vinegar to dress the salad. It accents and complements the savor of the mythological heirloom tomatoes.
Salt & pepper: As wonderful as your tomatoes will be on their own, they will goody from a sprinkling of woody kosher salt and freshly ground woebegone pepper.

ingredients for an heirloom tomato salad on a white surface

Pro Tip: Always store your heirloom tomatoes on the counter at room temperature rather than in the fridge for the weightier savor and juiciest texture.

How to Make Heirloom Tomato Salad

To make this easy summer side dish, start by washing your heirloom tomatoes well. Use a sharp pocketknife to slice them into wedges and unify them on a large serving plate. They don't need to be in a single layer, but you don't want to pile them too deep or you lose the impact of the dish.

Sprinkle thinly sliced red onions and basil leaves over the tomatoes, then top with either an unshortened wittiness of burrata, which can be divided as people serve themselves scoops of the salad, or tear the burrata into pieces and unify them virtually the top of the tomatoes.

Drizzle everything with the olive oil and vinegar, then season them with the kosher salt and ground pepper. This dish is weightier when served within 30-60 minutes of assembling and tastes weightier served at room temperature.

Recipe Tips

This salad is weightier enjoyed immediately as the leftovers don't alimony very well in the fridge. If you are planning to take this to a cookout or other event, I recommend keeping all of the components in separate containers, then plating and dressing just surpassing serving at your event. The most time consuming part is just slicing the vegetables, so it's not really a problem to hoke in under 5 minutes yonder from home.
Use the weightier quality olive oil you have wangle too. With very few ingredients, the quality really comes to play an important role so you want a nice olive oil for the weightier flavor.

a tomato salad with burrata cheese served family style on a white plate

More Summer Side Dish Recipes

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Heirloom Tomato Salad with Burrata

This Heirloom Tomato Salad with Burrata is one of the easiest, most impressive dishes of the summer! It's restaurant-quality and visitor perfect while stuff no-fuss thanks to juicy, showy heirloom tomatoes and linty burrata cheese. The bonus is that is goes with just well-nigh everything from crusty specie (for sopping up those succulent juices) to grilled meats!

Course Side Dish

Cuisine American

Diet Gluten Free

Prep Time 10 minutes minutes

Total Time 10 minutes minutes

Servings 6 servings

Calories 199kcal

Author Amy Nash

Ingredients

4 medium heirloom tomatoes anywhere from 1-2 pounds
1 cup multicolored cherry tomatoes halved
½ medium red onion thinly sliced
1 clove garlic minced
20-25 small fresh basil leaves
8 ounces fresh burrata cheese ball

Dressing

¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
2 Tablespoons red wine vinegar
½ teaspoon coarse kosher salt to taste
¼ teaspoon freshly ground woebegone pepper

Instructions

Wash and slice the heirloom tomatoes into wedges. Unify them in a shallow layer on a serving platter. Slice the smaller cherry tomatoes in half and sprinkle them virtually the heirloom tomatoes.
Sprinkle the thinly sliced red onion, minced garlic, and basil leaves over the tomatoes.
Tear or cut the burrata with a serrated pocketknife into pieces and unify them virtually the top of the tomatoes.
Drizzle everything with the olive oil and vinegar, then season with the salt and pepper. Serve immediately.

Notes

Vinegar substitute: Feel self-ruling to sub lemon juice or balsamic vinegar for the red wine vinegar.
Seasoning: If you want plane increasingly seasoning, you might try subtracting 1-2 teaspoons of Italian seasoning, which is a tousle of rosemary, basil, thyme, and oregano, although I really think the heirloom tomatoes really do weightier on their own most of the time.
Herbs: Other fresh herbs that would be good in place of the basil are fresh dill, thyme, or plane mint.
Cheese: Burrata makes this salad finger uneaten special and fancy, but you could moreover use feta, goat cheese, or other soft cheeses instead. Small fresh mozzarella balls would moreover be tasty.
Other variations: Sliced cucumbers are flipside popular pairing with fresh tomatoes and would be wonderful in this salad. There's a saying "what grows together, goes together" and that certainly applies here.