Vegetables are a cornerstone of Italian cooking. The general term is le verdure (vegetables, plural), while a fresh l'insalata (salad) might be served as a side, a starter, or even part of a main course. Among the most common ingredients are i pomodori (tomatoes — the foundation of countless sauces), la cipolla (onion), and l'aglio (garlic, which is essential to most soffrittos).
Another staple that rounds out Mediterranean flavors is le olive (olives, plural), which appear on antipasto platters, in pasta sauces, and on pizza. If a menu offers a contorno, that's typically a vegetable side dish — so learning the names of common vegetables makes ordering much easier.
Fresh fruit plays a role at breakfast, as a dessert, and sometimes as a partner to cheese. The general word is la frutta, but you'll want to recognize specific names too: la mela (apple), la banana (banana), l'arancia (orange), il limone (lemon), and l'uva (grapes). Notice that most fruit names take the feminine article "la," with "l'" used before vowel-initial nouns like l'arancia and l'uva.