Fruit salad, the possibilities for this dish are truly endless. Fruit salad can be made completely different based on what ingredients are available depending on the season, and if someone beat you to that last grapefruit in the produce aisle. This Instructable uses many typical ingredients found in fruit salad with the slight twist of using sweet cherry tomatoes to give this fruit salad a great taste.

When reading this why not make some mental notes on what you like in your salad and post your recipe at the bottom for others to see.

Enough talk, let's get chopping!

Step 1: Ingredients

Ok guys, we're playing with knives here, use your noodle and be careful! They don't call me 4-Fingers for nothing. The methods I use here are not difficult, however require you to be comfortable using kitchen utensils, be smart, go slow and this will be a breeze.

In this variation I used the following fruit:
-cherry tomatoes
-bananas
-pink grapefruit
-apples
-tangerines
-mandarin orange
-lime

Equipment needed:
-large bowl
-sharp chef's knife
-cloth (or paper towel), you're going to get messy!
-cutting board
-colander to wash tomatoes (and other fruit too if you like)

Step 2: Grapefruit

This is a pretty cool technique I learned for cubing fruit like grapefruits with a peel, this method works for loads of fruits with a rind.

Step 1
Cut of both ends off, you will want to cut deep enough to the fruit to remove all the rind and pith. Not as shown below, but I'm a pro so I'll fix it when i shave off the skin in the next few steps.

Step 2
Put the fruit so one of the flat ends is on the bottom, then with your knife at an angle start 'shaving' the rind off the fruit. Start at the top and work your way down following the contour of the fruit until you hit the cutting board. Go slow, the technique is a little awkward at first, but after your first fruit you'll be an expert!

Step 3
Continue your way around until the rind is removed.

Step 4
clean up any thick bits left over. It's ok to have some pith on your fruit. Spending too much time cutting the pith off makes this more of a chore, and honestly you won't even notice once it's all mixed in, so don't make a mission out of it.

Step 5
Half the fruit. Then with one half cut just off the center to make wedges. By cutting this way you can avoid trimming up the center of each wedge. The only time you will need to cut out the pithy center is on the final wedge. This method works great for limes. I know it sounds crazy to re-learn how to cut fruit, but once you figure this out you will wonder why you ever cut them any other way.

After you have your clean wedges go ahead and cube them up, make them random sizes so that every bite will be a different mix!

Step 3: Apples

I use this method any time I need to cut apples, whether it's for apple pies or just to munch on.

Step 1
Slice in half, then into quarters.

Step 2
Cutting the first leg of a V shape into the core of the apple.

Step 3
Cutting the second leg of the V.

Step 4
The V shape pops out and with it the core and stem. All you are left with is a clean wedge of apple.

Once all your apples are done simply cube them all and fire them into the bowl.

Step 4: Tangerines

Alright tangerines, listen up! You're next!

Chop if those bottoms and peel those suckers. Use your fingers to separate them into the wedges they they naturally break into (thanks Mother Nature).

Now tangerines have seeds, and biting into one of those when you're enjoying your fruit salad is a real bummer, luckily I found a way to cut those tasty orange wonders into the right shape and remove the seeds in the same cut. Take your wedge and lie it flat, then eye it up into thirds and make your cuts, since the seeds tend to stay in the middle of the wedge you'll avoid cutting the seeds into slivers, from your newly cut thirds you can just poke out the entire seed and you're done!

Again, vary the size of your cuts. Having inconstant shapes in your fruit salad is what we are aiming for.

Step 5: Bananarama

No special techniques here, just chop chop chop! Mix up your cuts too, I cut one banana into simple slices, and the other I cut lengthwise then chopped again, now I have all sorts of sizes!

Step 6: Cherry Tomatoes

I love tomatoes, however sometimes they are hard to cut, no matter if they are large or small there is something about the skin of the tomato that is natures equivalent to kevlar armour.
Pushing down or sawing back and forth is not the way to cut tomatoes (as seen in first picture).

There's 2 easy ways to cut tomatoes:

1) use a bread knife.

2) first poke a small hole in tomato skin with point of knife (picture 2)
then follow through with the slice, just like magic! (picture 3)

Using this method will allow you to cut any type of tomato using almost any kind of knife. I cut my tomatoes into quarters, and left some as halfs.

Step 7: Save the Bits!

With all those heels you cut off why not put the juice right back into the mix? Take your ends and squeeze them into the bowl.

Step 8: Mix and Serve!

That's it! Mix that bad boy together and you've got yourself a great fruit salad for breakfast or midnight snack. The best part is that it's unique as you want to make it, try it with yogurt and granola, or with ice cream, or just on it's own!

Some final thoughts:
There are endless ways to make a great fruit salad, the limitation is what you can imagine, almost all fruit works for this, some other ideas are
-guava
-pineapple
-mango
-pear
-blackberries
-watermelon
-cilantro
-etc.

Personally I would stay away from honeydew melons and cantaloupes. I know, I know, they are a staple in every fruit salad, but that's more of a reason to try something different. I find that most of the time they are flavourless and are there to add bulk to the fruit salad, and why bother adding filler to something that can be so tasty? Are you excited about eating a hamburger which consists of 40% filler, or 100% awesome?
So be creative, try something new, and when you've discovered the perfect recipe post it below to share with everyone else!