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This fresh tomato salad is fresh and light, and every bite tastes like summer sunshine! It’s super easy to make and goes with almost everything. This salad makes eating your veggies a pleasure!
This salad works well all year round, which makes it a bright addition to your dinner rotation. During the summer, I love it with freshly grown, vine-ripened garden tomatoes, farmer’s market, or on vine-ripened tomatoes from the supermarket. Roma tomatoes and grape tomatoes make this salad perfect in the cooler weather months.
If you love delicious fresh salads, I hope you’ll next try our cucumber tomato salad, cucumber tomato feta salad, KFC coleslaw, or carrot salad!
Let’s make this salad!
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
Certain flavors just scream SUMMER, or I’m wishing it was summer NOW! And this recipe has them all…
- Fresh, juicy tomatoes
- Savory and tart flavors
- Perfect side dish for any main meal
- Refreshing to the MAX!
What Are The Best Tomatoes For This Salad?
All ripe tomatoes will work well. I love to make this salad year-round. During the fall and winter, it works well with Roma tomatoes, grape tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, or a combination of these. I like to cut the Roma tomatoes into wedges and the smaller tomatoes in half.
During summer, I love garden-fresh tomatoes, farmers market tomatoes, tomatoes on the vine, or Heirloom tomatoes from the supermarket. These large tomatoes generally need to be cut into large chunks because they tend to be larger.
Tomato Salad Ingredients
- Tomatoes: Ah, the star! For this recipe, you want the freshest, ripest tomatoes you can find. They should be plump and heavy, with no bruises or soft spots. A great way to tell that a tomato will be packed with flavor is to give it a sniff, right at the top where the stem is—if it has a strong, sweet, “tomatoey” smell, you can almost bet it’s going to taste amazing.
- Salt + Pepper: This recipe calls for table salt and freshly cracked black pepper. It does not use coarse or kosher salt.
- Arugula: Look for fresh, crisp arugula.
- This delicious but fickle green can easily bruise if you’re too rough with it, making it way too bitter. So, handle your salad gently! If you do not like this lettuce, try this salad with baby spinach.
- Basil: Fresh basil enhances this salad. I would only use dried basil in an emergency. Thinly slice the fresh basil.
- Oil: I use extra virgin olive oil.
- Red Wine Vinegar: I like the tangy, rich flavor this type of vinegar adds. It adds the complexity we’re looking for.
- Garlic: This is one of the few recipes where I only use one garlic clove! I want the full, summer-esque tomato flavor to come through.
- Cheese: I love this salad with creamy Chevre. Chèvre is the French word for goat’s milk cheese. Chevre has an awesome tangy flavor and can be soft, creamy, or firmer and crumbly. I used a creamy variety in my recipe. The creamy tartness of the cheese goes beautifully with the brightness of the tomatoes in this salad.
Tips + Variations
- Add Protein: I like this best served as a side, but I occasionally add protein. If you’d like to do so, try it with cooked shrimp, cooked shredded chicken, or cooked sliced sausage.
- Dressing: We drizzle all our dressing ingredients over the salad, then gently toss. I like to use red wine vinegar, but when it comes to tomato salad, balsamic vinegar is never a bad choice! It’s a little sweet, so it would add some complexity to the vinaigrette, and combined with the basil, it would give this salad a Caprese twist. In a pinch, you can use white vinegar. It doesn’t have the nuanced flavor profile, and it’s very slightly more acidic, so add a bit less. Sherry vinegar is also excellent in this recipe. I make a delicious Sherry vinegar salad dressing that I serve on my strawberry salad. It illustrates how delicious this ingredient is when used in salads.
- Different Cheese: This salad is great with feta cheese or burrata. Fresh mozzarella gives it a Caprese salad spin! Each cheese adds a different flavor.
- Add Olive: Salty, briny olives are a great addition. I love them in my Spanish influence 1905 salad, a lovely example of olives paired with tomatoes (and other deliciousness!).
- Red Onion: I love to add thinly shaved red onions to this salad.
- Avo: Adding avocado is a delicious thing to do!
- Crunch: This salad is delicious topped with toasted pine nuts or slivered almonds. The crunch gives it some nice texture.
- Different Herbs: Try this salad with fresh rosemary. Rosemary has a strong aromatic flavor. Start by adding just a little at a time. Too much can become overpowering. Try it with parsley, dill, or thyme. You can also add a combination of fresh herbs.
- Timing: Make sure to read through the whole recipe before you get started so you have an idea of how the timing works for each step. The tomatoes need to rest for a while after you salt them, which helps them absorb the excess liquid so the finished salad doesn’t turn out watery. It’s an important step, so don’t skip it!
- After salting and resting the tomatoes, they need about 15 minutes to marinate in the dressing and really soak up those flavors. This is a very simple tomato salad, but the resting and marinating combined take about 45 minutes, so be sure to plan ahead! Believe me, it’s worth the passive time investment.
Storing + Freezing + Make-Ahead
- How Long Can You Keep This In The Refrigerator? Leftovers love the fridge! The more chilled, the better. It can be kept in the fridge for up to four days.
- Can You Freeze This Salad? No, just no!
- Make-Ahead Tips: This salad needs time to marinate—up to 15 minutes—but too long, and the arugula will start to wilt. If you want to make this salad up to a day ahead of time, exclude the arugula until just before serving!
- Food Safety: If you’d like more info on food safety check out this link.
Serving Recommendations
Skip the large bowl and serve this beautiful salad on a platter to show it off! I prefer this salad served at room temperature.
Main Dishes I Love This With:
This marinated tomato salad recipe is just dying to enhance your summer barbecue or grilling! It’s delicious with Greek Chicken, pollo asado, cilantro lime chicken, shish kabobs, grilled flank steak, grilled beer brats, or simple grilled steaks. If you’d like a delicious marinade for those steaks, check out my steak marinade.
For summery meals cooked indoors, we like this with my traditional meatloaf or brown sugar meatloaf, Crockpot pulled pork. crockpot BBQ pulled chicken, crockpot chicken and gravy, honey balsamic sheet pan chicken, smothered chicken, honey glazed salmon, or my old-fashioned chicken and dumplings(I have a pot of this simmering on my stovetop almost every week, all year round!). I also like this with a side of couscous.
Other Sides To Pair With
If you’re serving this salad and are looking for other sides to serve it with, we like it with our pineapple coleslaw, grape salad, maque choux, Paula Deen corn casserole, southern collard greens, southern corn cakes, Hawaiian macaroni salad, or my classic macaroni salad,
How To Make Tomato Salad Recipe
-
In a medium bowl, sprinkle tomatoes with 1/2 teaspoon salt and gently mix.
-
Transfer tomatoes to a baking sheet lined with three layers of paper towels to absorb tomato juices. Allow tomatoes to drain for 15 minutes.
-
Flip tomatoes and continue to drain for another 15 minutes.
-
Place drained tomatoes in a medium bowl. Add arugula, basil, oil, vinegar, garlic, 1/8 teaspoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon pepper. Very gently toss until seasoning is evenly distributed. Allow the salad to marinate for 15 minutes. Taste and adjust seasoning as needed.
-
Sprinkle the salad with cheese.
- Serve.
More Tomato Recipes
More Salads You’ll L-O-V-E!
- Asian Coleslaw
- Pineapple Coleslaw
- Pea Salad
- Creamy Cucumber Salad
- Three Bean Salad
- Mexican Corn Salad
- Pizza Salad
- Broccoli Salad
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Marinated Tomato Salad
Ingredients
- 4 large ripe tomatoes, cored and cut Into 1/2 inch wedges
- 1/2 teaspoon plus 1/8 teaspoon (or to taste) salt- divided
- 2 cups baby arugula
- 1/4 cup fresh basil chopped
- 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
- 1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
- 1 clove garlic minced
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper or to taste
- 1/2 cup Chevre crumbled
Instructions
- In a medium bowl, sprinkle tomatoes with 1/2 teaspoon salt and gently mix. Transfer tomatoes to a baking sheet layed with three layers of paper towels. Allow tomatoes to drain for 15 minutes. Flip the tomatoes and continue to drain for another 15 minutes.
- Place drained tomatoes to a medium bowl. Add arugula (2 cups), basil (1/4 cup), oil (1 tablespoon), vinegar (1 tablespoon), garlic (1 clove), 1/8 teaspoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon pepper. Very gently, toss until seasoning is evenly distributed. Allow salad to marinate for 15 minutes. Taste and adjust seasoning is needed. Sprinkle salad with cheese (1/2 cup) and serve.
Fans Also Made:
Notes
- Add Protein: I like this best served as a side, but I occasionally add protein. If you'd like to do so, try it with cooked shrimp, cooked shredded chicken, or cooked sliced sausage.
- Dressing: We drizzle all our dressing ingredients over the salad, then gently toss. I like to use red wine vinegar, but when it comes to tomato salad, balsamic vinegar is never a bad choice! It’s a little sweet, so it would add some complexity to the vinaigrette, and combined with the basil, it would give this salad a Caprese twist. In a pinch, you can use white vinegar. It doesn't have the nuanced flavor profile, and it's very slightly more acidic, so add a bit less. Sherry vinegar is also excellent in this recipe. I make a delicious Sherry vinegar salad dressing that I serve on my strawberry salad. It illustrates how delicious this ingredient is when used in salads.
- Different Cheese: This salad is great with feta cheese or burrata. Fresh mozzarella gives it a Caprese salad spin! Each cheese adds a different flavor.
- Add Olive: Salty, briny olives are a great addition. I love them in my Spanish influence 1905 salad, a lovely example of olives paired with tomatoes (and other deliciousness!).
- Red Onion: I love to add thinly shaved red onions to this salad.
- Avo: Adding avocado is a delicious thing to do!
- Crunch: This salad is delicious topped with toasted pine nuts or slivered almonds. The crunch gives it some nice texture.
- Different Herbs: Try this salad with fresh rosemary. Rosemary has a strong aromatic flavor. Start by adding just a little at a time. Too much can become overpowering. Try it with parsley, dill, or thyme. You can also add a combination of fresh herbs.
- Timing: Make sure to read through the whole recipe before you get started so you have an idea of how the timing works for each step. The tomatoes need to rest for a while after you salt them, which helps them absorb the excess liquid so the finished salad doesn’t turn out watery. It’s an important step, so don’t skip it!
- After salting and resting the tomatoes, they need about 15 minutes to marinate in the dressing and really soak up those flavors. This is a very simple tomato salad, but the resting and marinating combined take about 45 minutes, so be sure to plan ahead! Believe me, it's worth the passive time investment.
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