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Fruit Salad Tested Recipe
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A colorful Fruit
Salad is a nice way to serve fresh or dried fruits. I started making this
salad because I used to love eating canned fruit cocktail as a kid, but I
wanted something more natural tasting using fresh fruit. This Fruit Salad
is easy to make and is low in calories and high in
nutrition and flavor. All you do is macerate your favorite fruits in a sugar syrup.
Enjoy it for breakfast, or as a snack, or it's very nice poured over a
scoop of vanilla ice cream. A sugar syrup, also called a simple syrup, is just a boiled
mixture of sugar and water that is often used to soak cakes and pastries.
But did you know that it can also be used to soften and sweeten fresh and
dried fruits? Now, there are so many ways to flavor the syrup. For this
recipe I'm using fresh mint leaves, lemon and orange juices, and
Limoncello (an Italian lemon liqueur made from lemon rinds. Limoncello is easily spotted for it's
bright yellow in color and comes in a tall thin bottle). But other ideas
are to add the seeds from a
vanilla bean, or maybe a
cinnamon stick, fresh lavender, or even a few whole
cloves.
When making a fruit salad, the quality of the fruit will
determine how flavorful your salad will taste. Summer does offer the widest selection of
fresh fruit (all kinds of berries,
peaches, cherries, nectarines, apricots, and plums), but even in the dead of winter
there are fruits like apples, oranges, pears, pineapple, seedless grapes,
kiwi, and bananas to choose from. And don't forget about adding dried fruits, as
dried figs, cranberries, cherries, apricots, and raisins add both color
and flavor to fruit salads. It is best to cut large fruits, like apples,
pears, and peaches, into bite
size chunks or wedges. Cantaloupe and honeydew can be cut into pretty round balls with a
tool called a melon ball scoop. If using oranges or grapefruit, remove the
rind and the inner white pith as it can be quite bitter tasting. The fruit
then needs to be separated into sections and all the seeds removed. Do this over a bowl
to catch any juices. The salad can be made several hours in advance of
serving and kept in the refrigerator. You can serve the fruit salad cold or at
room temperature. Delicious on its own or excellent with a shortbread
cookie. Another idea is to pour it over vanilla ice cream.
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Fruit Salad: Place the water
and
sugar in a small saucepan and bring to a boil, stirring
occasionally. Let boil about three minutes then remove from heat and cool to room
temperature. Stir in the Limoncello, lemon juice, orange juice, and mint leaves.
Add about 6-8 cups
of fresh and/or dried fruits. While you can serve the fruit salad right away, I
like to cover and refrigerate the salad for a few hours hours, or even
overnight, so the fruits have time to absorb the sugar syrup. Some fruits, like
bananas, should not be added to the sugar syrup until shortly before serving.
Serve the fruit salad cold or at room temperature.
Makes 8 - 1 cup
servings. Preparation time 20 minutes.
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Fruit Salad:
2 cups (480 ml) water
2/3
cup (135 grams) granulated white sugar
2 tablespoons Limoncello,
or to taste (optional)
2 tablespoons freshly
squeezed
lemon juice, or to taste
2
tablespoons freshly squeezed orange juice, or to taste
2 - 3 fresh mint leaves (optional)
6 - 8 cups (1.5 - 2 liters) of fresh and/or dried fruits
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