The Caprese Salad hails from Italy and resembles the 3 colours of the Italian flag – green, white and red. There is one salad that I can never get sick of and it’s the Caprese Salad. It’s very simple to make and it’s beautiful when its created.

All you need to do is have alternating slices of tomatoes, basil and mozzarella. Once it’s assembled, drizzle olive oil and balsamic vinegar on top. Then sprinkle a bit of salt and pepper.

Voila, it’s all done. I put all the basil in the centre since some people like differing amounts of basil. You can also stack it however you like. Some people stack it like a burger or even just have it as skewers. As long as those 3 items – Basil, mozzarella and tomatoes are in it, you can call it a Caprese Salad.

It’s a hit at parties because everyone loves cheese.

I’m a pretty lazy person when it comes to making dinner. I like to keep the mess minimal and not buy a million ingredients at the store. I don’t know why I always end up landing on BuzzFeed when I need shortcuts. I started reading about the different One Pot Pasta recipes.

I’m not one to follow a recipe and I just use it as a guide and then throw things into the pot because I try not to have any left over ingredients.

[tabs tab1=”Ingredients”]

[tab id=1]

• A box of cherry tomatoes, halved
• A pack of smoked sausages, sliced
• A pack of pasta
• 4 Cloves of Garlic, sliced
• Handful of basil or 2 tablespoons of Basil Paste
• 1 Onion, sliced
• Parmesan
• 3 Cups of Water
• drizzle of Olive Oil
• Salt and Pepper to taste

[/tab]
[/tabs]

Chop everything up and threw it in the pot or deep pan. I chopped the cherry tomatoes in half and sliced everything else up. It cooked quite quickly! Once it came to a boil, it was done in about 10 minutes. Just keep an eye on it till your pasta is al dente. If you decide to use dry pasta, it will take a bit longer.

Then I put in a handful of parmesan to make the pasta more creamy.

Save a bit of basil and sliced cherry tomatoes for garnish. Also, might as well throw more parmesan on top.

Bam! Dinner is served. It’s an easy dish to make and you can mess up the ratio of ingredients and it will still taste fine. I got M to give the dish a try and he loved it. Score! He didn’t die. I have such low standards for my cooking right?

From beginning to end, it only took about 20-30 minutes to complete this meal. It depends how slow or fast you prepare your ingredients.