Sweet Fruit Salsa is one of our favorite things to eat with Baked Cinnamon Chips. It’s a perfect family snack, a light dessert, or an awesome appetizer to take to a gathering. You can mix and match your favorite fruits, and this recipe gives multiple ways to customize. Serve it with the baked chips, or served on things like crepes, yogurt, oatmeal, or ice cream!
Scroll past recipe card for step by step photos and more details.
Sweet Fruit Salsa with Cinnamon Chips
Ingredients
- Fresh Fruit
- Sweetener of Choice
- Baked Cinnamon ChipsBaked Cinnamon Chips for serving
Instructions
- Chop fruit into equally bite-sized pieces. See blog post for lots of ideas, some of our favorite are: Strawberries, orange segments, pineapple, blueberries, mango, and kiwi. Sweeten with sweetener of choice. You can use granulated or powdered sugar, honey, or a low-calorie sweetener of choice. Salsa is great just like this, or feel free to try some of the flavor enhancers below!
- Citrus Juice: Try the juice from a mandarin orange or a squeeze of lemon or lime.
- Flavor if desired. Try a little grated ginger, or fresh chopped mint leaves, or a sprinkle of cinnamon, or top with shredded coconut.
How to make Fruit Salsa
When you were a kid did you ever read those “Choose Your Own Adventure” books? Like, “If you choose to enter the big scary building that says Do Not Enter then turn to page 47. If you choose to listen to your mother and go home for dinner turn to page 62…” and then you get alternate endings? Well this is a “Choose Your Own Recipe” post! There is really no right or wrong here- this “recipe” is more of a collection of ideas for customization. Have fun with it!
1. Choose Your Fruit
You can choose your fruit based on what’s in season, or flavors you love together, or colors. Here’s some ideas for a colorful fruit salsa. I love to make a rainbow version!
Red: Strawberries are my standard because they hold up really well, they’re usually inexpensive, and everyone loves strawberries. But watermelon, raspberries or pomegranate seeds would be fun too.
Orange: Mango , Peaches, nectarines, or orange segments work well.
Yellow: Pineapple! Fresh is best, but in a pinch, open up a can. I guess nectarines, peaches, and mangoes are all yellow as well.
Green: I love the bright color and great texture of Kiwi in fruit salsa. There’s always honeydew too.
Blue/Purple: Blueberries , blackberries, or halved grapes. I prefer blueberries because the size works well and they will stay more in tact. If you have extra large blackberries, you might want to cut them in half- but if you do, stir them in gently at the very end because the juices run all over.
2. Choose Your Sweetener
A little sweetener helps enhance all the flavors and marry them together.
Honey: I love the flavor of honey with fruit.
Powdered Sugar: It dissolves fast and gives a light sweetness.
Brown Sugar: Takes longer to dissolve but adds an interesting flavor. Much deeper flavor than white sugar.
Granulated Sugar: What I use the most. It tastes good and makes a nice syrup with the fruit juices.
Swerve: This is my favorite calorie-free sweetener. The powdered version looks and feels just like powdered sugar and is a great way to keep this dish healthy.
3. Choose Your Extras
Pick and choose from these flavor enhancers.
Citrus Juice: Lemon, lime, orange. Just a few big squeezes. The fruit will give off a lot of juice so you don’t want to add too much additional liquid, but a few squeezes of citrus really enhances the flavor of the overall dish. My absolute favorite is a couple of cuties or mandarines cut in half and squeezed in there.
Cinnamon: A few dashes of cinnamon goes great with the cinnamon chips.
Mint: A little chopped mint reminds me of cilantro in regular salsa and makes everything so fresh tasting. But beware, a little goes a long way and if you add too much it will really overpower the taste of your yummy fruit. My husband hates it when I put mint in- he thinks it ruins the salsa and tastes disgusting, so you may want to go sparingly on that one!
Coconut: shredded coconut is especially good when you have tropical fruits like pineapple and mango in your salsa. Sprinkle some on top or stir it in, but either way do it just before serving or it will get all soggy.
Toasted Coconut: If you’re taking this to a party, then add some toasted coconut on top for great presentation.
Ginger: A little fresh ginger adds a fun twist. A little will go a long way. P.S. ginger + coconut = yum.
4. Eat it!
I like to chill it before serving, but you can definitely eat immediately if you’d like. Serve with Baked Cinnamon Chips for dipping. Also fantastic over ice cream! Ooh, how about cinnamon chips AND ice cream. Now that’s a party.
Questions & Reviews
These were delicious!! I especially liked the cinnamon chips with it! Nice that they are baked, too!
You can also use vanilla pudding mix for the sweetner. I make fruit dishes with this all the time and it helps keep the apples and such from browning.
Made this for my 35th class reunion….and am bringing it again today,for my 40th!
It was a hit!
Thank you so much for this breakdown! Wow! I’ve been playing around with a strawberry/cherry version and this was really helpful. Looking forward to exploring the rest of your blog.
Thanks!
Allison
@TheNewbieFoodie
I just made this for my husband and a friend and they are in love! Fairly cheap to make and soooooooooo tasty!
just what I was looking for, the blackberries really make this salsa look great. can’t wait to try it.
This looks amazing. Going to a cookout tomorrow, so i’m gonna try it along with the cinnamon chips. Do you think it’ be alright to cut up the fruit the night before (store in separate containers) and just mix it together before we go? Thanks for the recipes!!
Yep, that would be fine!
Made this today to go with lunch, now all I can think about it putting what’s left on cheesecake or angel food!
I’ve made a similar fruit salsa, but always with apples, kiwi & strawberries. And then usually a little orange juice concentrate or apple butter and talk about yummo! I will have to try it with some of the other fruits. I love it, a friend made it years ago for a party and my kids sat at her kitchen table after the rest of dinner was done and ate it straight from the bowl when they ran out of cinnamon chips until it was gone.
Sara, I saw you today on KTVB – you were great! And thank you for sharing this recipe. Now I know what I’m going to take to my primary teachers’ bbq this weekend.
I made this for a party recently and served it with Sweet Potato Chips (gluten free)from the Food Should Taste Good company. Sooooo good. I actually used a food processor on pulse for the first bit and then cut small chunks for varied texture. I added fresh lime juice and honey and used strawberries, kiwi, and pineapple. I was nibbling on it while prepping and had to stop myself.
For more info on the awesome chips I mentioned, look here:
http://www.foodshouldtastegood.com/#/sweet_potato/
Would it still work if you used the already pre-cut and made up fruit bowls they sell at the grocery store as long as you cut the pieces even smaller ?
Sure, that would work just fine 🙂
I featured this on my blog today and wanted to give you a heads up. I have made this so many times and just love it, thanks again for the great recipe!!!
http://marleymanor.blogspot.com/2011/02/sweet-fruit-salsa-with-baked-cinnamon.html
I made this with the cinnamon chips for a party last week and it was a hit! Mine didn't look near as pretty–I made the mistake of adding a few frozen raspberries too early (not at the end like the recipe says) and it dyed the whole thing–yuck!
One thing I wish I'd done differently is chop the fruit pretty small. I left it larger and it was more like fruit salad than a dip for chips.
Your recipes are so good! I made them tonight and loved them. Thank you! I added one passion fruit instead of the lime juice and really liked the result!
I know you posted this forever ago, but I finally got around to blogging about it today! http://ificould-ificould.blogspot.com/2010/08/fruit-salsa.html
Thanks for the yummy recipe!
We made this as a "side" for dinner on Sunday with the cinnamon chips. It was so yummy and all three of us inhaled it (including our 18 month-old). It was perfect with some lime juice and sugar.
Thanks for the awesome idea. I decided I'll make this the next time I have an excuse to make an appetizer for something.
Cec and Dal- don't be scared, I promise you really can't mess this up! If you're nervous, I'd just go for plain 'ol sugar. Just start by adding a couple of spoonfuls and taste as you go. It really just depends on how sweet you like it. Like I said, you can't mess up!
I really want to make this for our big group this weekend, but I am nervous because I don't know how much of what sweetener to add. Any suggestions? Thanks 🙂
I just made the Sweet Fruit Salsa and the Cinnamon Chips…..THEY ARE AWESOME!!! Thank you so much! It is so good! Healthy snack, and i'm also going to use it at my sisters baby shower in 2 wks!!!
Someone posted a link to it on another site i'm on, i've already forwarded it on to my friends/family. Love your Site!!!
Yum! I've made this several times since you posted it and it always gets rave reviews! Actually, I've turned at least 10 people onto your blog through this recipe!
So…I'm a cheapskate…I usually do strawberries, kiwi and apple. I just can't justify spending the money for all the extra fruit! Honestly, as long as the fruit is fresh and yummy it will taste fantastic!