Grapefruit is a healthy citrus fruit with a peculiar bitter taste. It appeared as a result of crossing a pomelo and an orange. Salads with the addition of grapefruit can truly surprise home and decorate any festive table.
Grapefruit contains a huge amount of vitamins and minerals. It is rich in vitamin C, antioxidants, vitamins A, E, PP, glycosides, essential oils. Eating such fruits helps to heighten appetite, but at the same time regulates the concentration of sugar in the blood and speeds up the processes of burning fat. The glycoside naringin will give the fruit its original bitter taste. Most of all it is in the films that cover the slices. Before using the fruit, it is better to remove the films, and you should also peel them from the peel rich in essential oils.
Salads with the addition of grapefruit are original and very tasty. You can combine grapefruit with other fruits as well as nuts, vegetables and even meat.
Salad with grapefruit, nuts and spinach
The calorie content of citrus fruits is quite low. To prepare a diet salad, you need to supplement the grapefruit with foods that contain a minimum amount of calories. You can surprise guests with an interesting and light salad, which contains the following ingredients:
- 1 large grapefruit;
- a bunch of spinach;
- a few feathers of green onions;
- 200 g walnuts (in shell);
- 2 tsp honey (always liquid);
- 1 tsp mustard;
- a little salt;
- 2-3 st. l grapefruit juice;
- 2 tsp wine vinegar;
- some olive oil.
Cooking steps:
- Grapefruit for salad should be ripe. Carefully cut the peel of the fruit, peel the fruit and divide it into wedges. Clean the slices from films, connecting partitions. The films contain a substance that gives the product a strong bitterness. If you don't remove them, the salad will not taste good. Cut each slice into 2-4 pieces. Squeeze juice from 1 slice. It is useful for making sauce.
- Sort the spinach, remove the hard bases of the leaves, rinse, dry and cut coarsely with a knife. You can tear the spinach with your hands. It contains a lot of vitamin C, and when it comes into contact with a metal knife, this valuable substance is oxidized and destroyed. Rinse green onions and chop finely.
- Peel the walnuts from the shell, remove the partitions and chop the nuts with a knife. Put all the ingredients in a deep salad bowl, add a little salt.
- To prepare the sauce, you need to mix a little olive oil (2-3 tablespoons) with mustard and honey. It is better to choose homemade and liquid honey so that the sauce is more uniform and not very thick. Add wine vinegar and grapefruit juice and mix all ingredients well. Serve the salad to the table immediately after cooking. You can decorate it with walnut halves.
Shrimp, avocado and grapefruit salad
Grapefruit goes well with avocado and shrimp. To prepare an exquisite and very tasty salad according to a simple recipe, you will need:
- 2 large grapefruits;
- 250-300 g shrimp;
- 1 avocado (large and ripe)
- a bunch of large lettuce not bitter (arugula is ideal);
- 100 g of pine nuts;
- half a lemon;
- a little salt;
- 2 cloves of garlic;
- 2-3 sprigs of dill;
- 6 tbsp. l olive oil.
- Peel grapefruits, cut and remove all connecting partitions, films. You can first divide the fruit into slices, then remove the films.
- It is better to choose boiled and frozen shrimps for this dish. The semi-finished product must be thawed in air or in water if there is very little time for cooking. Next, you need to peel each shrimp from the shell. You do not need to cut them. Only large king prawns can be cut in half.
- Peel the avocado, cut in half, remove the pit and cut the flesh into large slices.
- Tear the greens with your hands. Arugula is ideal for salad, but you can use regular lettuce if it's not bitter. You can also add spinach to the dish.
- In a separate bowl, mix olive oil, chopped dill. Squeeze the juice from half a lemon into the mixture, add a little salt and mix everything well again.
- In a deep salad bowl, combine shrimp, arugula or other leafy greens, avocado and grapefruit. Sprinkle the dish with peeled pine nuts and pour generously with the dressing. It is better to serve such a salad to the table immediately after preparation.
Grapefruit and chicken salad
To prepare a grapefruit salad with chicken fillet according to a very successful recipe, you will need the following ingredients:
- 2 large chicken breasts;
- 1 grapefruit;
- half a fork of Chinese cabbage;
- half an onion;
- a little salt;
- some olive oil;
- 1 tsp mustard;
- 1 tsp honey;
- juice of half a lemon.
Cooking steps:
- Peel the grapefruit, remove the films, cut each slice into 2-3 pieces and put in a salad bowl.
- Peel the onion from the husk, cut into thin half rings. Chop the Peking cabbage finely. Put vegetables in a salad bowl and mix everything well.
- Boil chicken breast in lightly salted water. It only takes about 10 minutes. Cut the breast into thin slices, then lightly fry them. Place the slices in a salad bowl, carefully spreading over the top.
- To prepare the dressing, mix the juice of half a lemon, mustard, liquid honey and olive oil. The proportions in this case can be adjusted at will. If you want to make the dish less spicy, you should reduce the amount of mustard. Drizzle the dressing over the salad and serve immediately.
In this recipe, Chinese cabbage can be replaced with regular lettuce and watercress sprigs can be added. This type of leafy green has a very specific flavor and is very healthy. It is important to observe the measure so that the bright taste of watercress does not drown out the flavors of other ingredients.
When serving, you can lay the dish on top of Chinese cabbage leaves or other greens. If you want to reduce calories, you do not need to fry the chicken. It is better to add boiled meat cubes to the salad.
Salad with grapefruit and salmon
Grapefruit tastes well with lightly salted red fish. You can prepare a delicious and delicious salad that can be a decoration for any table. This will require:
- 1 large grapefruit;
- 1 large cucumber;
- a bunch of lettuce;
- some arugula;
- 100 g olives;
- 200-300 g of salmon (preferably slightly salted);
- a little salt;
- 1-2 tbsp. l lemon juice;
- olive oil.
Cooking steps:
- Peel the grapefruit, divide into slices and peel each of the films. Cut each wedge into 2 pieces.
- Cut the salted salmon, separate from the bones and cut the fillets into thin slices. For the preparation of salad, you can also take ready-made chilled slightly salted fillet. Rinse the cucumber, cut in half lengthwise, and then cut into thin circles across. You do not need to remove the peel first, if it is not very hard and does not taste bitter.
- Tear the lettuce with your hands. Several types of lettuce can be used for this recipe. It is better if they have different shades.
- Put salad, grapefruit slices, salmon slices, cucumber in a deep bowl. Add pitted olives. You can put them in a salad bowl either whole or cut in half. It all depends on your taste preferences. Add a little salt to the salad and mix well.
- To prepare the dressing, mix olive oil with lemon juice and pour over the dish with this mixture. Decorate the salad with arugula sheets. You can replace them with sprigs of dill or parsley.
All salads with the addition of grapefruit are recommended to be seasoned only with extra virgin olive oil. It is better not to use sunflower and other types of oils, especially if they are flavored.
