I was asked to bring a fruit salad to a brunch event over the weekend, which gave me the perfect opportunity to think about what elements are important in fruit salad. First and foremost is obviously the fruit. You have to add in fruit that your eating audience enjoys, paying attention to food allergies or general dislikes. Since fruit is the star of the dish it is important that your guests get pieces of all the contributing fruits in each bite. This being said, cutting and chopping the fruit is very important. Even things such as grapes can be halved. Yes, it is time consuming especially when you just want to throw it all it all in the bowl, but trust me, a fruit salad is so much better when you get a savory taste of all the fruits with each bite. I typically slice bananas and then quarter each slice, basically chopping the fruits into quarter inch pieces. A trick (to make things easier) is to go to Whole Foods or Trader Joe's where they have pre-cut fruit, which saves you half the time. Especially when it comes to mango's, pineapple, honeydew or melon, please, do yourself a favor and buy pre-cut fruit and then dice it up even smaller. It is also very very important to get fresh fruit. Poor quality fruit can ruin a fruit salad, especially when some of the fruit is fresh/ripe and other fruits (all put in the same bowl) are mealy, soft, or over-ripe. Each bite needs to have slight crunch and a refreshing taste.
My fruit salad was a huge hit this weekend and I actually had a guest comment on how easy it was to eat due to the size of the fruit. So I thought I would share a suggestion about the benefits of dicing the fruit :)
Serving: I find it most appealing to serve fruit salad in a glass bowl, that way everyone can see all the beautiful fruits (and the fruits of your labor; no pun intended). I would also recommend setting out small plastic clear cups or small glass serving bowls so the fruit salad can be individually scooped out. This gives your guests control over how much they would like. Hopefully they will try a little bit and be itching for more!
My fruit salad this weekend consisted of:
Strawberries
Raspberries
Blackberries
Blueberries
Green grapes
Pineapple
Watermelon
1 Apple
2 Pears
2 Bananas
Melon
Honeydew
Other suggestions: kiwi & mango
I made Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies today and they are awesome! I found the recipe on recipe.com, but tweaked it to my liking. Here is my recipe. I highly suggest you try them! xo
ReplyDeleteJen's Oatmeal Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chip Cookies:
Ingredients
3/4 cup butter
1/2 cup white sugar
1 cup packed brown sugar
2 eggs
3/4 cup peanut butter (add chopped peanuts!)
1/4 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Pinch of cinnamon
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups rolled oats
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
2. In a medium bowl, cream together the butter, brown sugar and white sugar.
3. Beat in the eggs one at a time, then stir in the peanut butter, milk and vanilla and pinch of cinnamon.
4. Combine the flour and baking soda, stir into the creamed mixture.
5. Finally, stir in the rolled oats and chocolate chips.
6. Drop by teaspoonfuls onto an un-greased cookie sheet, press them down with the back of a spoon (they really puff up if you leave them in balls of dough)
7. Bake for 10-14 minutes in the preheated oven, until the cookies are lightly toasted on the edges. Remove from the baking sheet to cool.
ENJOY!
Your fruit salad was DELICIOUS!!! thanks for making it and sharing!
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