Korean Style Fruit Salad

This is an old fashioned food. It is made from different kinds of fruit, hard-boiled quail eggs, crabsticks, and peanuts, all mixed with mayonnaise. Does it sound weird or interesting to you? =P I guess, when mayonnaise was introduced in Korea, this salad was one of the original uses for it. In Korea, when somebody moves to a new house, they invite family or friends to have a meal together. I remember going to those kinds of parties with my parents many times. Almost every party had this salad. My mom also made it whenever we had a party at our house. As a kid, it was one of my favorite menu items. The fun part of eating this salad was digging to find the best parts: the crab and the eggs. Oops, that does not sound like good table manners, but my excuse is that I was a kid. ㅋㅋㅋ Nowadays, there are many different kinds of fancy salad dressings from the Western world in Korea, so this old fashioned fruit salad is not as common as it was before. However, many people including me still miss this old fashioned salad every now and then. The sweetness from mixed fruits, slight saltiness from the crab sticks, nuttiness from the peanuts, and the egg flavor mix together with mayonnaise equals yummy~~

Main Ingredients

• 1 Red Delicious Apple (1 Cup)
• 1 Tangerine or Mandarin Orange
• ½ Asian Pear (⅔ Cup)
• ⅔ Cup Strawberries
• ⅔ Cup Cucumbers
• 10 Quail Eggs
• ½ Cup Crabsticks
• 30 Unsalted Peanuts
• ½ Cup Mayonnaise

Directions

 

Soak 10 quail eggs in cold water for about 10 minutes. This helps to prevent the eggs from breaking when you boil them later.

 

In 2 cups of water, add the quail eggs and ½ tsp of sea salt. The salt also helps to prevent the eggs from breaking and give them a little flavor. Cook on high.

 

Once it starts to boil, reduce the temperature to medium. If the temperature is too high, it will make the eggs break. Cook for 7 more minutes.

 

Immediately after they finish boiling, drain the hot water and leave the eggs in cold water for several minutes. This helps make removing the shells easier.

 

Peel off the eggshells.

 

Prepare about 30 unsalted peanuts.

 

Peel 1 tangerine or mandarin orange. Remove the white strings and divide them.

 

Slightly peel off the cucumber skin. This way you can get some nice green color in your salad.

 

Cut ⅔ cup of cucumber into ½-inch cubes.

 

Cut ⅔ cup of strawberries in half.

 

You can use about 8 cherry tomatoes instead of strawberries if you want.

 

Cut 2 Korean crabsticks into ½-inch cubes. It should make about ½ cup.

 

Cut ⅔ cup of Asian pears into ½-inch cubes.

 

Like the cucumber, slightly peel off 1 apple. Use a sweet apple like Red Delicious.

 

Cut 1 cup of apple into ½-inch cubes.

 

In a large mixing bowl, add all of the ingredients and ½ cup of mayonnaise.

 

Mix it gently. I only used mayonnaise for mine. If you want, you can add a little bit of salt or sugar depending on your taste in this step.

Before serving, chill this salad in the refrigerator for several minutes so that it will taste even better. Enjoy this recipe. Thank you.