COOKING WITH KIDS: Summer Fun Fruit Salad

Summertime is when peaches, berries, and melon are in their prime. Depending on where you live and shop, you may also find local plums, grapes, and figs.

Take your kids to any local farmers market to meet the farmers who grow their food or visit a pick-your-own farm for a seasonal adventure. While you stock up on berries and melons, look for fresh mint and basil as well—these herbs are my secret ingredient to any summer fruit salad. You can also add a tropical selection of bananas, mangos, peeled oranges, or pineapple from your local supermarket.

Once you’ve got all the fruit home, let your kids get involved in the prep. They can help make “fancy” fruit salad parfaits for breakfast or brunch or enjoy a cone of fruit salad as a fun and nutritious snack any time of the day. This was the case for me several weeks ago when I visited my best friend in Florida. Her four grandsons, Jackson, 11, twins Garrett and Brooks, 8, and Cooper, 6, all love fresh fruit, and I had a great time showing them how to cut and prep a fruit salad.

Tricks for cutting and peeling fruit:

1. Buy and assortment of melon baller scoops so kids can make melon balls of all shapes and sizes. Pro tip: Melon balls freeze beautifully. Keep them on hand to use as “ice” with a still or sparkling glass of water or lemonade.
2. Avoid mushy strawberries, blackberries, and raspberries by waiting to rinse and cut them just before you’re ready to serve.
3. If snapping a banana stem end is too difficult, simply squeeze the tip of the blossom end of the fruit. You can easily peel from there.

When Brooks wanted a mango, I showed him a fun (and safe!) way to cut this tricky tropical fruit:

1. Keep in mind that a mango seed is long and flat, so instead of peeling the mango, begin by cutting the fruit away from the seed. (This is a good job for an adult.)
2. Stand the mango up on one end and use a sharp paring knife to cut just to the right and just to the left of the seed. You’ll have two halves of beautiful mango pulp. Each half looks like a little cup with a mango skin bowl.
3. With a little direction and a butter knife, your kids can take it from here. Have them cut into the pulp, but not through the skin, making parallel cuts from one end of the mango to the other. Then turn the mango and do the same thing over again, so it looks like you cut a grid into the fruit.
4. Next, press the skin side of the fruit in so that you turn the half of the mango inside out. The cubes of mango pop up and you can eat them right off the skin or use the butter knife to cut the cubes off and add them to your fruit salad.

Once all the fruit is peeled and cut, set it up like a buffet and allow each person to build their own fruit salad, or make it a parfait by layering in your favorite yogurt. Top it off with a sprig of fresh basil or mint and add a drizzle of honey.

Want to add in one more fun chopping technique? Instead of a sprig of fresh herb, cut the basil or mint into what is called a chiffonade. Simply roll several leaves and stem of either basil or mint into a tight bundle and then use a knife or scissors to cut the bundle into tiny strips, and you have a chiffonade to top off your fancy fruit salad. Enjoy!

HEIDI BILLOTO is a Charlotte-based food and travel writer. Visit her at HeidiBillottoFood.com or on Instagram @heidibillotto.