Fall Fruit Salad, How to Balance Thanksgiving and the Holidays

Full of fresh seasonal fruit tossed with a light, bright lemony dressing, this Fall Fruit Salad is a perfect, very welcome way to balance all of the other rich, heavy desserts on the Thanksgiving and Holiday table. Not only can you throw it together in a few minutes, but there's a not-so-SECRET must-do tip that'll make everyone LOVE it. Shall we?

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• What Ingredients You Need for Fall Fruit Salad
• What are the Best Fruits for Fall Fruit Salad
• Most Important Tips for the BEST Fruit Salad
• More Fall Fruit Recipes
• Fall Fruit Salad Recipe

What Ingredients You Need for Fall Fruit Salad

For Fall Fruit Salad:

• Apple, 1 large Honeycrisp or other variety that is tart and crisp
• Pear, 1 Asian pear or 2 large Bosc
• Persimmons, 2-3 Fuyu
• Pomegranate, 1 cup arils
• Kiwi, 2
• Mandarin oranges, 3 peeled and segmented
• Pepitas, ½ cup or nuts

For dressing:

• Lemons, 2 juiced and zested
• Maple syrup, 2 tablespoons (optional)
• Ginger, ½ teaspoon ground (optional)
• Sea salt, ½ teaspoon, optional

HIGHLY recommend that you double the recipe and serve it for Thanksgiving. Then, refrigerate the rest and serve it the next morning along with brunch.

What are the Best Fruits for Fall Fruit Salad

Apples. Use your favorite variety. I recommend using one that leans toward more tart and crisp like Honeycrisp. If you're going for visual appeal, try an apple variety that's pink or red on the inside like Lucy Glo which is marbled light pink, Pink Pearl, and Hidden Rose which are a brighter, uniform pink.

Pears. For salads, I like pears that are firm/crisp rather than soft/buttery. All varieties of round, tan-colored Asian pears, Comice pears, and Bosc pears have the best texture for a salad.

Kiwi. Despite association with "tropical," kiwi grow in California and are in season in Fall! And, if you see yellow or red kiwi, pick them up! They'll add more color to the salad.

Persimmons. There are two varieties of persimmons commonly available. For this recipe, use Fuyu, which is squat, round like a tomato and is best when firm-to-hard like an apple. Hachiya persimmons, which are oblong shaped like a large acorn, are meant to be eaten when super ripe, and will be too soft for this recipe.

Pomegranate. HIGHLY recommend you buy a whole pomegranate and pull the arils/seeds out yourself, rather than buying the pre-packed plastic containers of just arils. The arils will be fresher. Plus you can use what you have leftover for Pomegranate Salsa.

Mandarin Oranges and Other Citrus. Use fresh Mandarin oranges or other orange citrus, and if you have it in you to peel each segment individually, it will make you a star. If you have to resort to canned Mandarin oranges, then just don't.

Substitutions

Different Fruit. You can substitute any fruit for another in the same amount, or include fruit that happens to be in season and catches your eye at the market. If it's early enough in the season, you might get lucky and even find figs!

Grapes. I personally prefer eating grapes directly out of hand rather than in a salad, but I am including them here because if you can find super "snappy" green grapes, they do add a great texture to the salad.

Pepitas, Nuts, and Other Seeds. I use pepitas in this Fall Fruit Salad because we have a tree nut allergy in our family. However, toasted pecans or walnuts are great options.

You Can Cut the Fruit Bigger to Make it Pretty. To make the Fall Fruit Salad more visually interesting, leave the fruit in larger pieces that show off their natural shapes. Cut apples and pears into paper-thin wedges and slice kiwi and persimmons across their middles to expose the star/flower shapes inside.

How to Prevent Browning on Apples and Pears. If you make the Fall Fruit Salad in advance, toss cut apples and pears with some lemon juice first. Then put the salad together and tossing with the rest of the dressing.

Sprinkle Pomegranate and Pepitas Last. Because they are so small, pomegranate arils and pepitas will inevitably end up at the bottom of the bowl once the salad gets tossed and spooned around. To avoid this, sprinkle them on top just before serving to keep them on top!

Garnish with Fresh Mint. Fresh mint is available year-round at the grocery store, and will add a brightness and color to the salad.

More Fall Fruit Recipes

Food for Afterthoughts

We hadn't driven unfamiliar routes enough times for me to find out whether he was one of those guys.

You know, one of those guys who have too much testosterone to unfold a map. Turn on the GPS. Ask for directions. Because you know, having an internal compass is a requisite characteristic of a real man.

But we didn't have to.

I had persimmons and pomegranate. I was sitting at my desk trying to verify ingredients and ratios and techniques and tips from the usual 147 tabs open in my browser. That's what I do. Before I head anywhere east of the 405 freeway, I map my route on Google maps. I "show traffic." I cross check with sigalert. I turn on the GPS in my phone and search my destination.

And before I bake anything, I recipe-tize.

"What are you doing?" he called out from the kitchen.

"I'm looking up recipes."

"We don't need a recipe." He might have sounded offended, slightly alarmed, or maybe that's my imagination re-blogging recent history.

"Ok. Well, are you going to make simple syrup 1:1 or 1:2 or...?" Ratios. No, I don't use recipes often in the kitchen, but ice cream, like traffic, is science.

"Trust me."

"I know."

"I can tell."

"I'll do it by taste."

"I am a man."

He didn't say the last one, and certainly not with that emphasis, but I could sense it. Hear it in the water coming from the faucet, the pot clinking against that black iron pot thing on the stovetop, the sugar "ssshing" out of the bag. He was making simple syrup. Without measuring. Like a man. Somewhere in there I rolled my eyes.

His sorbet was perfect.

I got us lost on the way to lunch.