A hollowed-out watermelon makes a beautiful serving dish for fruit salad. Decorate the bowl by attaching strawberries and other fruits to the watermelon rind with toothpicks.
TIPical Mary Ellen host Mary Ellen Pinkham offers tips for making delicious fruit salads.
Use halved and hollowed-out melons or oranges as a cup to fill with fruit salad. Watermelons work well as a serving dish for a large amount of fruit salad.
Combine the watermelon with melon-balled flesh from cantaloupe and honeydew melons. Add strawberries, grapes, oranges, pineapples and other fruits.
Keep fruit from turning brown while preparing a fruit salad by squeezing lemon juice in a bowl of cool water before adding fruit.
Never hull strawberries until they have been washed, or they will absorb too much water and become mushy.
Put oranges in a 250-degree oven for 10 minutes before peeling to remove the white fibers from the fruit.
If a pineapple isn't quite ripe but is needed for a fruit salad, remove the top and the skin, slice and place in a pot. Cover with water and add sugar to taste. Boil a few minutes, cool and refrigerate. The pineapple will now taste fresh and crunchy.
Toss the fruit with a mixture of 1/2 cup sugar, 1/2 cup fresh lime juice, 1/4 cup fresh lemon juice and two teaspoons grated lime peel. Let chill for 30 minutes, then transfer to the watermelon basket and serve.
For another variation on the fruit salad, layer fruit in a gelatin mold one layer at a time. Swirl in some liquid gelatin and let set. Repeat until the mold is full.
Another unique fruit salad is a yogurt and spiced-grape salad. Mix together 1/4 cup low-fat vanilla yogurt, 1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon and 1/8 teaspoon ground cardamom. Add one cup each seedless green grapes and seedless red grapes. Chill and serve.
Arrange a fruit pyramid on a cake stand for an hors d'oeuvre platter at a party. For the center of the pyramid, cut the flesh off of a large pineapple so that only the core remains. Attach to the middle of the cake stand and arrange whole and cut fruit around it, forming a pyramid.
Serve fruit salad as a light and refreshing desert after a heavy meal. Serve the fruit salad with a small scoop of sorbet. Garnish with a mint sprig.
Resources Melons for the Passionate Grower
by by Amy Goldman, Victor Schrager (Photographer)
Artisan Books (division of Workman Publishing), 2002 Order this title from Amazon.com.
