Original recipe of the week: Spiced Exotic Fruit Salad & Lime Syllabub

No, it’s not just a fruit salad, but this recipe has a slight twist to make it more interesting! With infused spices, sweet syrup and a tangy lime syllabub to eat it with, it’s a perfect summer dessert. Well, what with the heat wave we are having at the moment, it’s a great opportunity to make it, as it’s light and full of punchy fragrant spices.  We made it for our supper club last night and our guests loved the flavours! 

Spiced Exotic Fruit Salad

Serves: 6-8 

What you will need:

1 pineapple (cored, peeled and cut into cubes/small pieces)

1 punnet of strawberries (cut into halves)

1 papaya (peeled and cut into cubes)

5 kiwis (peeled, cut into rounds)

2 bananas (peeled, cut into rounds – do this last minute)

2 mangoes (peeled, cut into small pieces/cubes)

Fresh or canned lychees (optional) or any other exotic fruit

Spiced syrup

What you will need:

250g caster sugar

150ml water

2 vanilla pods and seeds

2 cinnamon sticks

1 tsp fennel seeds

5 cardamom pods, split

5 cloves

Lime syllabub

What you will need:

568ml double cream

3-4 limes, zest and juice

3 tbsp icing sugar

1 vanilla pod, seeds only

What you need to do:

1. Firstly chop, dice and prepare all the fruit, minus the bananas and place on to a serving platter.
2. Start making the syrup. Put the sugar, half the water, vanilla pods, cinnamon sticks, fennel, cardamom and cloves into a small heavy based saucepan over a medium to high heat. Slowly bring to the boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Once it starts to bubble, stop stirring and let it turn golden brown in colour.
3. Stand back from the pan and stir in the remaining water, be careful, as it will splash! Stir again to dissolve any caramel. Make sure it’s a golden colour, or coats the back of the spoon in consistency. Take off the heat and let it cool slightly.
4. Pour the syrup over the fruit and leave to cool completely, then cover with cling film and chill in the fridge until serving.
5. Make the syllabub. Beat the cream, lime juice, zest, vanilla seeds and icing sugar together, untill soft peaks are formed. Taste test on whether to add more sugar or lime for flavour. Chill until serving.
6. When ready to serve, take out, chop the bananas over the fruit and serve on the platter with the chilled creamy syllabub.

   Delicious!

   Selina Periampillai