This painting was part of a ‘Tastes of Summer’ series I created 10 years ago as part of a Christmas exhibition for Greenhill Galleries. The series was a celebration of berries, you will see a few more before we finish the Alphabet of Fruit, which just wouldn’t be complete without a fruit salad.

So here’s a golden oldie from the ‘South Australian Education Department’s Manual Of Domestic Art, (cookery)’, my mother’s text book from 1938. I’ve translated it from imperial to metric measurements. It’s HUGE quantities by current standards, but Mum had 11 siblings! So probably just right, if you could get the fruit.

Fruit Salad

Ingredients

1 Pineapple, peeled, eyes removed, cut into small pieces

6 bananas, peeled and cut in rings

3 oranges, peeled, cut into small pieces, remove pips

12 passionfruit, halved and pulp scooped out

6 apples, pare, core and dice

500 g strawberries, washed and hulled

castor sugar

275 ml whipped cream

Method

Mix all the fruit together, or layer in a glass bowl and sprinkle each layer with castor sugar. Let stand an hour before using. Decorate with whipped cream, sweetened and flavoured, and put it through a forcing bag with a rose pipe.