Caprese Salad -- ALL Homegrown and Homemade

Wondering about the name of the salad? It's insalata Caprese, meaning a salad in the style of Capri, the famed island off the coast of Italy.
One of the best reasons for growing your own tomatoes is being able to make as many Caprese salads as you want. We used homegrown Prudens Purple and orange Valencia in the salad we fixed yesterday. If you'd like garden advice about tomatoes, we have a couple of videos where Tricia plants tomatoes, and talks about how to prune them and address any diseases.
Grow your own basil too, for Caprese salads, and for fresh pesto (plus frozen pesto to brighten up winter days). Sweet Basil is the variety layered in our salad. Tricia shows you how to plant and nurture your basil plants in our video, Growing Basil.
As for the cheese, you can't grow that, but it's simple to make in your kitchen (just 30 minutes) and a fun project to do with kids. We use our Mozzarella Cheese Kit and never have any trouble. Get Tricia's tips on how to make mozzarella in this video. The article linked to the video includes directions for making the cheese with or without a microwave oven.
Growing Tomatoes

Growing Basil

Making Mozzarella Cheese
