Joni Sare, cooking instructor

Fruit Kabobs w/Sweet’n Sour Almond Dipping Sauce

Yes, these three foods are FRUIT: cantaloupe, bell peppers and cucumbers… and that’s why I paired them and that they taste so well together.

I deconstructed the cantaloupe “Fruit Soup” (that I created for cooking demo at Intel) and made these “Fruit Kabobs” instead (i.e. they have the same ingredients as the Fruit Soup). Will serve these this Saturday at Atherton Appliance cooking demo, at July 4th backyard party and again at a catering gig Tuesday evening for the Nightcrawlers in Los Altos.

Red Bell Pepper, Cucumber, Cantaloupe with a sweet'n sour dipping sauce.
The dipping sauce: sweetened with the fruit, thicken with Roasted Almond Butter, spiced with Chinese 5 Spice and soured with balsamic vinegar (not shown). Recipe is below.
The Tuscan-style Cantaloupe from Dulcinea Farms has the perfect color, and had the perfect ripeness.

The recipe:

Makes 1 cup of dipping sauce.

1. Blend in food processor until well mixed:

  • 1/2 cup chopped cantaloupe pieces
  • 1/2 cup chopped red bell pepper pieces
  • 2 tbls roasted almond butter
  • 1 tsp Chinese 5 Spice
  • 1 tbls Balsamic vinegar

2. Peel, remove seeds and cut fruit into small bite-size pieces and put one of each on a toothpick:

  • cantaloupe
  • cucumber
  • red bell pepper (roast first if you want to remove the skins)

Tips:

  • You may need 3 tbls roasted almond butter …depends how watery the fruit is.
  • Use a high-speed blender if you want the bell pepper skins to be blended (gone) and the sauce to be more emulsified.
  • Use red, seedless grapes instead of the red bell peppers.
  • Use watermelon instead of the cantaloupe, you’ll need more almond butter b/c the watermelon has more water than the cantaloupe.
  • Make the sauce one or two days ahead of serving time.
  • Cut the fruit into small bite-size pieces one day ahead of serving time.

Here’s another version, served at Atherton Appliance:

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