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Looking for a refreshing summer snack or party food? Try this sweet and spicy Mexican Fruit Salad recipe paired with an ice cold Modelo Especial!
I am so excited summer is officially here! We absolutely love this time of year! From backyard BBQs and movies under the stars, to pool parties and camping, hands down this is probably my absolute favorite time of year.
One summer activity that we look forward to is watching some of our favorite sports. Growing up we weren’t a huge sports family, but we did go to 2-3 baseball games every year and my brother played soccer. So, every spring and summer we would head out to the soccer fields and watch and cheer as my brother and his team mates would run up and down the field kicking and bunting the soccer ball.
After I moved away from home, I kind of forgot about how fun soccer was, that is until a few years ago when some friends of ours were hosting a watch party for the Beautiful Game. We still get together each year with friends to watch the Beautiful Game, and more and more often on a warm summer afternoon, when it’s too hot to be outdoors, we’ll turn on the TV and get sucked into the enthusiasm as we watch various soccer teams play and their dedicated fans cheer in the stadium!
In addition to being excited about all the fun things summer brings, like watching the Beautiful Game, I get so excited about summer produce. The melons, berries, peaches, tomatoes and summer squash are my favorite foods, and I can’t get enough of it.
Usually because I love summer produce so much, I usually buy more than what we can eat and so to use it all, I’ll make big fruit salads and fruit trays for snacking when we invite friends over for our cookouts and summer get togethers.
This Mexican Fruit Salad is the perfect summer salad! It’s inspired by the popular Mexican Fruit Cups that are common here in central/south Texas and Mexico and consists of a mix of fresh and juicy tropical fruits and has a spicy and salty chili lime dressing. You may not think the sweetness of the fruit and the salt and chili powder in the dressing would go together (at least I didn’t when I first tried these fruit cups many years ago) but the flavors complement each other beautifully for a unique summer treat. This salad is great on its own as a snack, but it is the perfect summertime dish when served with a crisp, ice cold Modelo Especial; since Modelo is an iconic Mexican beer.
I recently whipped up a big bowl of this fruit salad to serve at a backyard BBQ I hosted for friends and was happy that is was such a hit that I will be making it all summer long to serve not only at cookouts and for snacking poolside, but to serve paired with a Modelo Especial or Modelo Negra at this year’s Beautiful Game watch party!
- Fruit Salad:
- 2 cups diced honeydew
- 2 cups diced watermelon
- 2 cups diced cantaloupe
- 1 cup diced pineapple
- 1 cup diced mangoes
- 1 large whole pineapple, if desired for pineapple bowl
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- Chili Lime Dressing:
- 3 tablespoons honey or agave nectar
- 2 limes, juiced and zested
- 1/2 teaspoon sea salt
- 1/2 -¾ teaspoon ancho chili powder
- Combine all the diced fruit in a large bowl. Set aside.
- In a small bowl, whisk together the honey, lime juice and zest, salt and desired amount of chili powder to form dressing. Pour chili lime dressing over the fruit in the bowl and toss to combine.
- Salad can be eaten immediately or refrigerated for up to 4 days.
- For the pineapple bowl, cut about ⅓ of the pineapple off, leaving the stem attached to the larger piece of the pineapple. Make a cut around the outer edge of the pineapple. Make one cut in the middle piece of pineapple as well as several other cuts in the opposite direction (so that you have 6 large sections). Use a metal spoon to loosen and scoop out the precut pineapple chunks. Fill hollowed out pineapple with prepared fruit salad.
Note: Substitute any fruit listed with equal amounts of any of the following: diced strawberries, jicama, cucumber and/or papaya.
Are you a soccer fan just like us? Modelo is a high-quality beer that is proud of its Mexican heritage. Not only is Modelo brewed with a fighting spirit, it’s proud to be the Official Beer of the Beautiful Game! And for more tasty summer cocktails and recipes, visit Modelo online or follow Modelo on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram!