Making Your Own Fresh Summer Fruit Salad

With the abundance of inexpensive and fabulous summer fruits, there is really no reason not to be constantly enjoying your own fresh fruit salad. Delicious, vitamin-filled and figure-friendly, you can serve this salad for dessert or with some plain, unsweetened yogurt or granola for breakfast or for a light weekday lunch.

Fruit Salad

INGREDIENTS

• 8-10 cups fresh fruit: peaches, plums, apricots, seedless grapes, apples, melon, pineapple, bananas, assorted berries

OPTIONAL ADDITIONS:

• ¾ cup orange juice
• 3 tablespoons sugar
• mint leaves, juice of 1 lemon
• 1/8 cup liqueur

DIRECTIONS

1. Peel the thick skinned fruit: melons, pineapple, peaches, and apples. Plums and apricots need not be peeled. Slice or dice fruit and put into mixing bowl. Add grapes. Toss gently. Add bananas last.( Bananas turn brown when exposed to air.) Toss fruit lightly. Cover bowl. Chill 30 minutes. Taste.

2. Add orange juice and sugar for a sweeter taste. Add lemon juice for a tarter flavor.

3. Know your guests. A splash of liqueur always perks up a fruit salad for adults although often children find it an odd taste.

4. I like to add the berries as a decoration on top of the fruit salad. First of all, it looks pretty; and second of all you avoid the berries staining all the other fruit.

5. Mint leaves can also be added as decoration and also to impart a more exotic flavor.