There was a big sale in the grocery store’s produce department this past weekend. Oranges, grapefruits, and mangoes were all ten for ten dollars, and avocados were four for five dollars. I stocked up, and then Maggy and I went back to the grocery store and we stocked up some more. We went through a good bit of it, but by Monday night we were staring at a bunch of grapefruits and avocados.
We had already eaten a big green salad for lunch, so I started thinking about grapefruit salad for dinner. After a long afternoon of President’s Day sale shopping, I was feeling a little unmotivated in the kitchen. I said to Maggy, “Would it be OK if we just ate sectioned grapefruit as our salad?” Her reply: “I think you can do better than that.” She was right. of course.
I had a little fennel and red onion in the fridge, and so that’s how this salad was born. I didn’t want the pristine grapefruit sections to get all smudged with avocado, so I used them as the bed and tossed the avocado, fennel, and red onion together. The avocado in combination with the grapefruit and lemon juice made a wonderfully light dressing.
As I was topping the grapefruit with the avocado mixture, Maggy looked up and grabbed her camera. In just a few minutes my sectioned grapefruit had turned from “you can do better than that” to a recipe worth photographing and sharing.
- 4 large grapefruits, peeled, sectioned, and 2 tablespoons juice reserved
- 1 avocado, cut into medium dice
- ¼ large fennel, thinly sliced, plus a few fronds for garnish
- ¼ small red onion
- Salt and ground black pepper
- A few drops lime or lemon juice
- Place a portion of grapefruit onto each of 4 salad places. Mix avocado, fennel, and red onion along with reserved grapefruit juice, a light sprinkling of salt and pepper, and a good squeeze of lime juice; toss to coat and taste adding more salt, pepper, or lime juice to taste, if necessary. Top each portion of grapefruit with some of the avocado mixture. Garnish with fennel fronds and serve.
funny you should come up with this salad! i just made a similar one with navel oranges, red onion, avocado and kalamata olives with a dressing made of a little olive oil and orange juice, salt and pepper and a tink of chili powder for zing and color. it was wonderfully fresh, different and delicious. i’m going to try yours as soon as i get some fennel.
Your salad sounds good too, Sandy… and by the way, I love that word “tink.” I’m adding it to my my vocabulary!
I love this salad! I top it with warm toasted walnuts!
Hmm these look delicious, thanks for posting up this recipe, looks quite simple to make.
Simon