My delicious tropical fruit salad with a chilli, star anise, cinnamon and lime dressing is the perfect dish to round off the summer. The wonderful assortment of tropical fruits is brought to life with a beautiful sweet dressing, which has a sight hint of chilli, warming cinnamon and fragrant star anise. The whole dish is freshened up with tangy lime and perfumed passion fruit – this is sunshine in a bowl!
SERVES 4
90g/31⁄4oz/heaped 1∕3 cup caster sugar
5cm/2in cinnamon stick
2 star anise
1⁄4 tsp chilli flakes
juice of 2 limes
seeds and pulp of 3 passion fruit
1 mango, peeled, pitted and roughly chopped
1⁄2 pineapple, peeled, cored and roughly chopped
1 papaya, peeled, deseeded and roughly chopped natural
yogurt, to serve
- Put the sugar, cinnamon, star anise and chilli flakes into a large pan with 250ml/ 9fl oz/1 cup water and bring to the boil over a high heat. Stir continuously for 1 minute, or until all the sugar has dissolved, then reduce the heat to medium and simmer, shaking the pan occasionally, for 10 minutes until the liquid has reduced to a thin syrup. Transfer the syrup to a mixing bowl and set aside to cool. Remove the cinnamon to stop its flavour overpowering the dressing, but reserve for decoration.
- Once the syrup has cooled, pour in the lime juice and passion fruit and mix well. Add the mango, pineapple and papaya, then toss together so that the spicy, sweet- sour flavours of the dressing coat the fruit.
- Serve at room temperature or chilled with a generous dollop of yogurt and the star anise and cinnamon arranged on top.
From Mighty Spice Cookbook by John Gregory-Smith © Commissioned Photography by William Lingwood / Duncan Baird Publishers 2011
Mighty Spice Cookbook, John Gregory-Smith, Paperback, £14.99