Caprese Salad (Insalata Caprese)

This famous Italian salad, called Insalata Caprese in Italian, is so simple it requires only one thing, the best ingredients you can get. The salad seemingly originated on the Italian island of Capri, which lies off the western coast of Italy, not far from the mainland city of Sorrento, and with Naples not far up the coast. The three main ingredients, tomatoes, mozzarella and basil leaves, represent the colors of the Italian flag.
 
Ingredients:

3 large ripe tomatoes, cut into 1/4 inch slices
1 pound of mozzarella, also cut into 1/4 inch slices
10 to 12 large fresh basil leaves, torn in half
about 1 teaspoon coarse salt or to taste
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
freshly ground black pepper to taste
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano

Arrange the tomato slices on a platter, sprinkle each slice with a little salt, then put the mozzarella slices onto each tomato slice, followed by the basil pieces. Add a very little bit of both pepper and dried oregano, then give a good drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.

I put some Sicilian olives on the plate too ...

WORD HISTORY:
Pestle-This word, related to "pesto," goes back to Indo European "peis," which meant, "to crush." This gave Latin "pinsere," meaning, "to beat, to pound, to stamp, to crush." This then gave Latin the noun "pistillum," meaning, "pestle" ("tool used to pound and crush"). This was passed to Old French, a Latin-based language, as "pestel," and English borrowed the word in the 1300s as "pestle."