Why You Should Always Balance The Ingredients For Your Fruit Salad
There are as many reasons for making fruit salad as there are kinds of fruit. The contrast of cold, sweet, fresh fruit with any hot main course is delightful, and the zing of fruit's natural acidity wakes up your taste buds, especially if you use our tip for keeping your fruit salad fresh by adding some lemon juice. Growing or buying fresh herbs like basil or mint give you another way to elevate your fruit salad by infusing herbs and ingredients like fresh ginger into a syrup you can use to add both flavor and sweetness.
While the perfect fruit salad can serve as a highlight of a meal, one that's lackluster can make you think of the lousy fruit cocktail your school cafeteria used to serve from industrial sized cans, complete with far too many underripe pears and never enough cherries. How can you ensure your fruit salad is a success, rather than a sad disappointment?
Measure ahead for the perfect balance
Sure, eating a whole bowl of juicy, fresh strawberries can be satisfying, but the whole point of fruit salad is to let the variety of fruit, flavors, and textures each play a starring role. And according to Wonder How To's Food Hacks, the key is measuring out all the fruits before you combine them to ensure you have the perfect balance. They explain, "There's nothing worse than being stuck with a spoonful of 'filler fruit' when you dig into a fruit salad." And POPSUGAR agrees, saying that no one wants to feel as if they got the bottom spoonful of the dish.
Not only will measuring your fruit give you a balance of flavors, but it's also an opportunity to balance the colors of your ingredients. Bright blueberries contrasting with green grapes, yellow kiwi, and red raspberries give you truly a Insta-worthy fruit salad. And if you're looking for another tip for making your fruit salad even more special, try macerating one or more of the ingredients in a cordial like elderflower liqueur or a delightfully sweet, vinegary shrub.