Ambrosia Salad is a unique, sweet and creamy fruit salad with pineapple, mandarin oranges, grapes and maraschino cherries with coconut, Cool whip, sour cream, and pecans!
In a large bowl, combine all the ingredients and stir well.
Refrigerate salad until ready to serve.
You can reserve a few mandarin oranges and maraschino cherries to decorate the top of the salad.
Notes
Tips
Usually in many recipes you could get away with substituting another cream-based ingredient for the likes of sour cream or the Cool whip called for in this recipe but I strongly advise that you don’t use anything such cream cheese, cottage cheese, Greek yogurt, or heavy cream in this dessert salad - it’s going to impact on the overall taste and texture.
While you may think that canned fruit cocktail is an easy and convenient alternative to use in this recipe, I recommend that you stick with fresh fruit prepared by yourself. It’s going to taste much better and will also last longer, having a firmer texture to the fruit than a canned fruit cocktail that has been sitting in simple syrup.
Variations
Unsweetened Coconut. If you’d like to reduce the overall sweetness in this dessert salad, use unsweetened shredded coconut.
Fruitful. Other fruits can be used in this dessert salad such as bananas. If you don’t enjoy grapes, simply omit them. Regular oranges can also be used instead of Mandarin oranges.
Toasty. Toast the shredded coconut for a deeper nutty flavor in this Ambrosia salad.
Go Nuts. While I’ve used pecans, walnuts or almonds can be used instead.
Serving Bowl. Serve your Ambrosia salad in a large clear bowl or in single shallow glasses for special occasions such as Christmas.