One of the easiest summery salads that can be tossed at home is this awesome Cherry Tomato Salad. This Cherry Tomato Salad recipe is vibrant, tangy, refreshing and oh-so good! This salad is extremely healthy too and uses plant-based ingredients. Thus, also is vegan.
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Salads for Summers
I make it a point that at home, we consume a lot of salads, especially during summers. Not just as a quick, filling snack, but also as light meals or complete meals for lunches and dinners too. Like this Sprouts Salad, which we usually have as a light dinner.
Why salads? Also, because they are super easy to assemble, energizing and light on the stomach as well. Sometimes, you might be running late from work. For such times, salads are the best meals that you can quickly toss and eat to your heart’s content.
At home, I keep on working on salad recipes most of the times. You may never know which ingredient pairs well with which one and result in a crunchy, munchy delicious salad. This Cherry Tomato Salad is a preferred one, not just by me, but everyone else at home.
About Cherry Tomato Salad
Just like any other salad recipe, this Cherry Tomato Salad can also become a favorite of yours, quite instantly. These are many reasons why we love this salad.
Firstly it is simple and hassle-free to make, with flavors that hit just the right spots on your palate.
As this Cherry Tomato Salad doesn’t involve any sort of cooking on heat, you are consuming fresh and raw ingredients. It is also gluten-free and vegan.
Whether you are having an Indian, American, European, Middle Eastern or Continental meal, this Cherry Tomato Recipe fits everywhere as a healthy side dish.
It is also light on your tummy, gut-friendly and easy to digest. You could play around with this recipe and make it your own, simply by swapping or adding herbs, spices, seasonings that you like.
Ingredients You Need
Giving you a break-up of all the elements that make this Cherry Tomato Salad recipe, absolutely a rockstar one!
- Cherry tomatoes – You can even use grape tomatoes or small tomatoes.
- Herbs – I have used two of my favorite herbs, in the dried form – basil and parsley. I personally am a little biased towards basil. Hence, used it. You can add any other dried or fresh herb of your choice.
- Extra virgin olive oil – I used the Evoo one for that peppery and grassy flavor. If you have any other plain olive oil or a neutral flavored oil, add that. But the salad does taste best with olive oil.
- Vinegar – I gave my Cherry Tomato Salad, a sour, acidic taste by using an organic apple cider vinegar with the ‘mother.’ This one is simply the kind that is raw, unrefined and unpasteurized apple cider vinegar.
The ‘mother’ here are gut-friendly bacteria that are actually used when making apple cider vinegar, but removed in many packaged apple cider vinegar as they give a cloudy appearance. Check for it online or in stores, you’ll get it. However, you can also use red wine vinegar or balsamic vinegar instead. - Sweetener – Just a teeny-weeny bit of raw sugar to balance the sourness, and make it all harmonious in the salad. You can choose to skip adding it or use other alternatives like honey, palm or coconut sugar.
- Garlic – I go ga-go over garlic, always. Hence, used it in this recipe too. It imparts a slight pungency to the salad.
How to make Cherry Tomato Salad
Prep Tomatoes and Make Salad Dressing
1. Rinse 200 grams cherry tomatoes well. Drain all the water and keep the tomatoes for some minutes so that they dry naturally.
You can spread the tomatoes in a tray or board for drying. You can even wipe the tomatoes with a clean cotton napkin.
Usually, I rinse the tomatoes an hour before and then spread them on a plate. Once the water dries, I keep them in a bowl covered with lid.
2. Halve the cherry tomatoes which are larger in size keeping the smaller ones intact.
3. In a mixing bowl, take 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil and 2 teaspoons apple cider vinegar. You can use red wine vinegar, balsamic vinegar or white vinegar instead.
4. Sprinkle ½ teaspoon dried basil and ½ teaspoon dried parsley. You can even add ½ tablespoon chopped fresh basil and ½ tablespoon chopped fresh parsley.
Add ¼ teaspoon sugar or add as required and ¼ teaspoon crushed black pepper or black pepper powder.
Also season with ¼ teaspoon salt or according to taste.
5. Add 1 small peeled garlic clove which has been minced or crushed.
6. Whisk briskly so that the spices, herbs, oil, sugar, salt and vinegar are mixed evenly.
Make Cherry Tomato Salad
7. Add the halved cherry tomatoes.
8. Toss and mix so that the dressing coats the cherry tomatoes.
9. Serve Cherry Tomato Salad immediately. Salads especially tomato salads, are best served fresh. If you are unable to do so, then refrigerate for 1 to 2 hours and serve later.
However, on refrigeration, the taste of the salad does change. While serving, you can even add some grated vegetarian parmesan cheese.
Expert Tips
- Cherry tomatoes can be replaced with small tomatoes or grape tomatoes. You can also use regular tomatoes, but chop them in small cubes.
- The quantity of herbs can be increased or decreased according to your preferences. You can add herbs of your choice.
- Feel free to add your choice of spices. I prefer black pepper, but you can opt to add white pepper, cayenne pepper, ground cumin or any of your preferred spice.
- You can completely skip adding the sugar. Use other sweeteners like coconut sugar, palm sugar and honey in place of regular sugar.
- Olive oil is a must in this recipe, so do not swap it with any other oil.
FAQs
It is not necessary to cut the smaller cherry tomatoes into half. However, the larger cherry tomatoes must be halved.
Yes, you can.
Salads are eaten best when served fresh. Same goes for this Cherry Tomato Salad too. But if you are unable to do so, refrigerate the salad for 1 to 2 hours and then serve. However, doing so might change the taste of the salad.
You can garnish this salad with vegetarian parmesan cheese, herbs, nuts or seeds.
More Salad Recipes To Try!
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Cherry Tomato Salad Recipe
Ingredients
For oil & vinegar dressing
- 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
- 2 teaspoon apple cider vinegar with mother – red wine vinegar or balsamic vinegar or white vinegar can also be added instead
- ½ teaspoon dried basil or ½ tablespoon chopped fresh basil
- ½ teaspoon dried parsley or ½ tablespoon chopped fresh parsley
- ¼ teaspoon raw sugar or white sugar – add as per taste, optional
- ¼ teaspoon salt or add as required
- ¼ teaspoon crushed black pepper or black pepper powder – add as required
Main ingredient
- 200 gram cherry tomatoes
Instructions
Preparation
- Rinse the cherry tomatoes well.
- Drain all the water and keep them for some minutes so that the water on them dries naturally.
- Then, halve the cherry tomatoes which are larger in size keeping the smaller ones intact.
Making oil and vinegar dressing
- In a mixing bowl, take the extra virgin olive oil and apple cider vinegar.
- Sprinkle herbs, sugar, salt and crushed black pepper or black pepper powder.
- Add minced or crushed garlic.
- Whisk briskly so that the spices, herbs, oil, vinegar, salt and sugar are mixed evenly.
Making cherry tomato salad
- Add the halved cherry tomatoes.
- Toss and mix so that the dressing coats the cherry tomatoes.
- Serve Cherry Tomato Salad immediately. Salads, especially tomato salads, are best served fresh. If you are unable to do so, then refrigerate for 1 to 2 hours and serve later. However, on refrigeration, the taste of the salad changes.
- While serving, you can even add some grated vegetarian parmesan cheese or some herbs or nuts.
Notes
- Instead of cherry tomatoes, use grape tomatoes, small tomatoes. You can also make this salad with regular tomatoes. Chop them in small cubes.
- Feel free to add your choice of spices, herbs and seasonings to the salad.
- Use a good quality olive oil and do not swap it with any other oil.
- The recipe can be scaled easily to make for more servings.
Nutrition Info (Approximate Values)
This Cherry Tomato Salad recipe from the archives, originally published in April 2019 has been updated and republished on February 2023.
What mam!!!??? Your parents are south Indians!!?? I’m soooo happy to hear this????. I will definitely give your receipies a try.
I’m a big fan of butter chicken recipe, it’s such a pride to try it from the inventor of the recipe….
I’m basically focussing on non-vegetarian cooking for my little one, to boost his growth. I tried few recipes from YouTube but nothing helped him eat like how he enjoys it from your blog.????
thanks vidhya. i hope you like the south indian recipes from the blog. the books will definitely help you. i also hope your son likes the recipes you make from the books. happy cooking.
Hi mam,
This salad was like heaven, thanks for your lovely receipes, your website is my stress buster, and I have developed a lot of my culinary skills from you.
Day by day I’m getting encouraged and more interested to try something different, can you please refer me some South Indian cook books, Tamil cookbooks and also non-vegetarian cookbooks and their availability in USA mam.
My five year old son is a huge fan your chilli mushroom fry, he finishes his lunch box slurp….????
thank you vidhya. i am glad you liked the salad and it also feels good reading your comment. that is sweet to know of your son. wishing your family all the best.
regarding the books – there are many books for south indian and tamil cuisine. for non-vegetarian i can only recommend jiggs kalra’s books. the vegetarian recipes i have tried from jiggs kalra’s books were good. but just go easy on oil and ghee proportions in the recipes. for tamil cooking (specifically tambrahm cooking) samaithu paar is good as a guide. they have three volumes. but use your own proportion of ingredients when making the recipes. there are also books by chandra padmanabhan for south indian cooking. you will easily get these cookbooks from amazon.
I’m soooo grateful to hear back from you mam.
I would definitely try buying those books and start experimenting mam. Thanks a lot for your guidance.
You are truly my great inspiration ????
most welcome vidya. in fact, i have shared many south indian vegetarian recipes as my parents are from south. so you can try the recipes from the blog also.
do buy these books and i am sure they will help you. good cooking books are rare to come by and that is why i have mentioned these three books. one more book which i forgot was moti mahal cookbooks. moti mahal is a famous restaurant in delhi and these books have the recipes from this restaurant. kundan lal gujral was the inventor of butter chicken and this iconic dish made its appearance first time in moti mahal restaurant. the recipes are good. from this book, i have made a few vegetarian recipes and they were good.