Fruit Salad With Ginger
Do you remember fruit cocktail? Did your Mother think it was dessert or the perfect addition to Jell-O or a boxed cake, a way to dress it up?
I never understood the appeal of canned fruit – my only interest was in the cherry, that one maybe two or three cherry’s, if you bought a named brand instead of the store brand can. Yet, the idea, of a fruit salad, should not be dismissed, just because someone erroneously thought to can it, for I am sure some noble purpose.
Fruit salad, either as an actual salad course, a main course, accompanied with cheese, or a dessert, is wonderful way to announce summer has arrived!
The wonderful thing about fruit is that almost any combination of it pairs well together. You can add a bit of sugar and an acid, such as lemon or orange juice, to bring it together, or serve it in its own juices. However, if you are looking for something for a special occasion, you may like to try this wonderful salad with fresh ginger – again, any other combination of fruits would also work.
This is an exotic salad to serve as a first course, a dessert, or side dish with fish or poultry. It is more important to use fresh, good quality fruit, than to have all fruits listed.
Ingredients:
Dressing
3-4 teaspoons Fresh Ginger – peeled and grated or thinly sliced
1 cup of Orange Juice
¼ cup of Cranberry or Pomegranate Juice
2 teaspoons of Lime Juice
1/3 cup of Honey
2 teaspoons of Cardamom
Salad
1 ripe Cantaloupe – cut into bite size pieces
1 basket of fresh Strawberries – washed and hulled
1 cup of Grapes – your choice on kind, just fresh and without blemish
1 Pineapple – peeled and cut into bite size pieces
1 Mango – cut into bite size pieces, if available
1 Papaya – cut into bite size pieces, if available
Mint Leaves
Baby Greens or Bib Lettuce
Balsamic Vinegar
Directions:
Make the dressing or marinade first. In a small sauce pan bring all of the ingredients to a quick boil, and then turn down low, and let it simmer for about 30 minutes. You may add ¼ cup of water, if you feel that it is evaporating too quickly. You want to make sure that the ginger is given time to release its flavors. Once it has cooked, strain the dressing, and let it cool to room temperature.
Wash and cut the fruit, and place it in a large bowl. Drizzle ¾ of the dressing over the fruit, and using a wide, rubber spatula, mix the fruit, making sure it is covered completely.
You can either serve it in a large bowl or platter, or make up individual portions. In single bowl, right before serving, sprinkle mint leaves. For individual plates, if you like, I add a base of baby greens or make a little bowl out of bib lettuce, which I lightly sprinkle with balsamic vinegar, for a sweet and sour taste. In the middle of the greens, mound fruit, and then top with mint sprigs. Use leftover dressing to drizzle on plates.
A Bit Of Trivia:
The Mystery of Fruit Cocktail
“Fruit cocktail has been a staple of the canned fruit industry since at least the 1940’s. The combination of pears, grapes, peaches, pineapple, syrup and bright red cherry halves was one of the most popular products Del Monte Plant #3 produced. It is generally agreed that fruit cocktail was developed as a way to make use of the fruit scraps left when bruised or damaged fruits could not be used in canning. But the exact origin of fruit cocktail remains a mystery.
Label for Golden Morn Brand Fruit Salad, c.1920.Canner J.C. Ainsley of Campbell (California) began marketing a product called “fruit salad” in 1893, under the “Golden Morn” label. According to the Campbell Historical Museum, the fruit salad contained cherries as well as diced fruits. But the product was never called fruit cocktail. In 1958, an article titled “100 Years of Canning in the West” in the journal Canner and Packer credited Herbert Gray of San Jose’s Barron-Gray Packing Company with invention of fruit cocktail in 1930. Gray himself affirmed this claim in an interview with the San Jose Mercury News in 1969. The academic field of Food Science gives credit for fruit cocktail to Dr. William V. Cruess, a pioneer in the field and professor at UC Berkeley from 1911 until 1954. Dr. Cruess’ research focused on the use of fruit culls and by-products. And some Plant #3 workers claim that fruit cocktail was invented right in the plant on Auzerais Avenue.
However it came to be, Calpak’s “new” Fruit Cocktail premiered under the Del Monte name in 1938. Consumers were introduced to fruit cocktail as a stylish dessert suitable for formal dinner parties and entertaining. Plant #3 produced fruit cocktail continuously from 1941 until the plant’s closure in 1999.”
