Years ago, when my sister was an undergrad, she and her friend founded a Fruit Appreciation Club at their college. They tended to focus on fruits that I can best describe as complicated. Fruits that need just a little more effort than peeling a banana or an apple that you can just bite into.
Think coconut, or, my favorite example of complicated fruit: the pomelo.
I wait all year for citrus season so I can enjoy pomelos. Native to Southeast Asia, the pomelo has a thicker rind than a grapefruit. The enveloping membranes around the citrus fruit are thick and need to be cut with a knife and some very determined fingers.
I’ll be frank: It takes me about a half-hour to clean the fruit. But the time is worth it to get to the pink jewels that are sweet and juicy. In writing this article I learned that the grapefruit is a hybrid of an orange and a pomelo, but I always pass on grapefruit because it’s much too bitter for me.
Tossed with greens, rice noodles, a wonderful Vietnamese-inspired dressing, and topped with salty peanuts, the time is now for pomelo salad.
You can find pomelos in most grocery stores, along with the fish sauce. My go-to brand is Red Boat. You’ll notice in the photo that I topped mine with fried red onion that I found at Tran’s Market. A great addition, but not at all necessary.
I do use a piquant fish sauce in this recipe, voiding it as vegetarian, but I always skip the traditional dried shrimp because I don’t do shellfish. Pescatarians rejoice!
Ingredients
1 pomelo
1 finely shredded carrot
3 Tablespoons fresh mint
3 Tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro (feel free to skip if not a fan)
½ cup dressing (recipe follows)
One-quarter cup dry-roasted salted peanuts
Half a pound of rice noodles
2 cups of leafy greens
Directions
Prepare rice noodles according to package
Cut pomelo in half lengthwise, exposing the juicy fruit center and thick white pith between skin and fruit. Remove the yellow skin with either determined fingers or a sharp knife. Be warned: The skin is much thicker than the citrus you are probably used to.
Using your fingers, pull away and discard pomelo’s thick skin and pith, leaving lobes of citrus fruit enclosed in soft sacs. Using your fingers or paring knife, separate each section, gently pull out fruit and leave seeds and enclosing sacs behind. Seek to keep the pomelo in large chunks, but do not worry if it disintegrates into individual teardrop-shaped juicy bits. Compost pile of peel, pith and sacs.
In a large bowl, put the pomelo, rice noodles, greens, shredded carrot, mint, cilantro and about half the dressing. Toss gently to mix everything together. Taste to check if you need more dressing. Mound salad on a small platter and sprinkle with peanuts. Serve at once.
Vietnamese dressing
1 Tablespoon chopped garlic
2 Tablespoons granulated sugar
½ teaspoon chile-garlic sauce (such as sambaloelek), finely chopped fresh hot red chiles or 1 teaspoon hot pepper flakes
3 Tablespoons fish sauce
3 Tablespoons water
2 Tablespoons freshly squeezed lime juice
In the bowl of a mortar and pestle, if using, combine garlic, sugar and chile-garlic sauce and mash with a pestle to a paste. (Or combine them on your cutting board and mash to a coarse paste with a fork and the back of a spoon.)
Scrape paste into a small bowl and stir in fish sauce, water and lime juice. Stir well to dissolve sugar. I tend to put my dressing in small glass jar for ease in serving. Refrigerate for up to 1 week.
Molly Parr lives in Florence with her husband and two young daughters. She’s been writing her food blog, Cheap Beets, since 2010. Send questions or comments to molly.parr@gmail.com.