Recipe: Fruit Salad with Rose Syrup, Greek Yogurt & Pistachios

Not so much a direct recipe post with exact measures and ingredients today, more of an idea that works really well with a few of your favourites, and makes either an impressive but very easy dessert for a casual supper, or a special little treat just for you. When I was in the kitchen last month with Tonia Buxton and the guys from Total Yogurt we made Anarocrema, a fantastic little dessert made with fruit, yogurt and Anari cheese, all flavoured with a little rose water or orange blossom water, and garnished with chopped nuts and honey. This is my paired down version where you can keep most of the fixings in the store cupboard so you can whip sometime up at the last minute or jazz up your usual yogurt and fruit combo on a whim. Rose Syrup Fruit Salad 2

Rose Syrup Fruit Salad 1
East India Company Rose Syrup
While I do love working with orange blossom and rose water is is rather easy to overdo it, and past cooking sweet things they are not really multi purpose ingredients. The guys at The East India Company were kind enough to send me a bottle of their Rose Syrup Cordial to play around with for some Summer cocktails, but after some experimentation I found it was a much better substitute for rosewater in flavouring fruit salads.
Summer Fruit Salad
Just pour it a teaspoon at a time over freshly cut Summer fruits (I like strawberries, raspberries (though I did not have any the day I photographed this!), chunks of mouthwateringly ripe cantaloupe melon and blueberries), and gently fold it into the fruit until it is all coated and you’ve achieved the desired level of perfume.
Rose Syrup Fruit Salad 3
Rose Syrup Fruit Salad 4
Fill the bottom of your bowl or glass with Greek Yogurt. I like to use Total 0% in everything (I like the lighter taste, and it makes me feel a little bit more virtuous!) then top it off with your syrup coated fruit. Remember to pour any syrup that has been left behind into the bowl too. The syrup will cling to the fruit, but it will also run down into the yogurt as you eat and flavour that too. Top the whole thing off with pistachios, roughly chopped. I like them for the colour, but you could get equally as delicious results from using toasted almonds.

So, a very simple recipe that is not really a recipe. I love dishes like this you can just throw together with what you’ve got, and not really having to worry in advance about the details. Do any of you guys have any recipes that are not really recipes like this that you’re able to throw together at a moments notice?

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