Wash, dry, and tear your lettuce into bite-size pieces.

Cut Kalamata olives into thin slices.

Put a serving of lettuce on a salad plate.

Top with cucumbers, kalamata olives, and feta cheese.

Place grape tomato on the cutting board. Cut at a diagonal across the short side of the tomato.

Separate the two halves of the tomato.

Pick up one half of the cut tomato.

Rotate one-half of the tomato 180 degrees (turn it upside down.)

Press the two tomato halves together forming a heart.

Carefully pick up your heart-shaped tomatoes and artfully arrange them over the top of the salad.

Serve your festive salads with homemade Tomato Vinaigrette or your favorite salad dressing.

Cut vine-ripened tomatoes into quarters.

Sprinkle them with a pinch of salt and put into the bowl of a food processor (the food processor pictured at left is a mini one.)

Puree the tomatoes until just slightly chunky.

Pour tomato puree into a fine-mesh sieve set over a measuring cup.

Allow the juice to drip down into the cup.  Use a rubber spatula to press on the tomato solids to extract as much juice as possible.

Discard the seeds and tomato solids.

You will need ½ cup of tomato juice for one recipe. Discard any extra juice.

Pour tomato juice into a small saucepan.

Add red wine vinegar, oregano, and garlic.

Heat over medium heat, simmering until liquid reduces to 3 tablespoons.

Remove from heat and allow to cool.

Once cooled, slowly drizzle in the olive oil while continually whisking to create an emulsion (a good blending of a watery liquid with an oil.)

Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Drizzle over salad.