I love fruits and I’m so excited to share with you about International Fruits Day happening in just 2 days on 1 July 2015. On this Fruitilicious day, MBG Fruit Shop will be having the annual “Yes! Fruits†fruity festival, and for all the fruit fans out there, there will be a series of contests, culinary demos, educational nuggets at all MBG outlets from July 1 to August 31.
“MBG is marking a milestone this year with the introduction of its new fruits salad bars at Tropicana City Mall and Wangsa Walk Shopping Mall, with more to come. Our fruits salad bar caters to anyone who wants to mix and match their healthy snacks and for busy Malaysians who needs a quick nutritional boost. In fact, the Malay community should find our salad bars a convenient break-fast avenue during the Holy Ramadhan month, especially if they are tied-up and rushing. “At the same time, in the pipeline is our Nutritionist On The Go†– a community campaign which enables the public to consult MBG’s very own nutritionist at selective outlets to get nutritional consultation making its debut soon, enthused Adnan Lee, Managing Director of MBG.
In conjunction with the Yes! Fruits Fest, us bloggers and the public were invited for a day out at MBG Tropicana City Mall for a workshop with consultant dietician Indra Balaratnam who shared with us about how to use fruits in every meal from breakfast to dinner! How exciting ya. During the outing, we were challenged to make our own salad with any of the fruits from the newly launched salad bar, with any toppings we can use as well as fresh juices for making the dressing.
Indra shared with us some of her fav salad recipes and I will share her recipe with all my readers!
A. SUNSHINE RAINBOW SALAD
Perfect juice dressing for a light mixed fruit salad
Ingredients for the salad:
ï‚· Mango—diced
ï‚· Blueberries
ï‚· Strawberries—diced
ï‚· Green kiwi—sliced
ï‚· Raisins
ï‚· Almonds—slivered
Ingredients for the dressing:
ï‚· Juice of 1 orange
ï‚· Juice of 1/2 lemon
ï‚· Juice of 1/2 lime
ï‚· Orange zest
ï‚· 1-2 Tablespoons of honey (or to taste)
Method:
Whisk the dressing together in a large mixing bowl. Toss in the cut fruit. Chill in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes before serving. Indra’s tip: This fruit salad is full of vitamin C and a variety of antioxidants from the rainbow coloured fruit combination to help keep your immunity up as you start to face
Indra recommends this as a great breakfast alternative. I love the berries and zesty taste in this salad, it feels so healthy after eating this.
Indra’s tip: This fruit salad is full of vitamin C and a variety of antioxidants from the rainbow coloured fruit combination to help keep your immunity up as you start to face another hustle and bustle day.
B. COOL YOGURT SALAD
Ingredients for the salad:
ï‚· Salad leaves
ï‚· Cucumber—sliced
ï‚· Pink dragon fruit—diced
ï‚· Pears—diced
ï‚· Pineapple—diced
ï‚· Watermelon—diced
 Avocado – cored and sliced
ï‚· Nuts
Ingredients for yogurt dressing:
ï‚· 1 cup Greek yogurt
ï‚· 2 Tablespoons white vinegar
 1 ½ Tablespoons lemon juice
ï‚· 1/8 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
 2 Tablespoons chives – finely chopped
 2 Tablespoons fresh parsley – finely chopped
ï‚· Salt to taste
Method:
Mix all the dressing ingredients in a bowl and refrigerate to use when needed. Assemble the salad ingredients in a large bowl. Drizzle with the yogurt dressing. Indra’s tip: This yogurt dressing is perfect to cool you down for a light afternoon lunch. The yogurt provides protein, calcium and good probiotics. The fruits have fiber to aid digestion; plus the avocado and nuts have good healthy fats and Omega 3.
This salad can be taken in replacement of your lunch as it is quite filling and even contains nuts. It has all the needed five food groups to keep us full until dinner, or maybe a small tea time break. yet it is healthy and light enough to not make us sleepy after a heavy meal so we can remain productive at work instead of stealing a nap! I also love greek yogurt and it’s a great replacement of mayo in salad and makes it healthier.
Indra’s tip: This yogurt dressing is perfect to cool you down for a light afternoon lunch. The yogurt provides protein, calcium and good probiotics. The fruits have fiber to aid digestion; plus the avocado and nuts have good healthy fats and Omega 3.
C. SAVOURY SPICED GREEN APPLE & MANGO SALAD
Ingredients for salad:
 Green apple – thinly sliced
ï‚· Ripe mango—diced
 Fresh mint leaves – finely chopped
ï‚· Roasted cashew nuts
Ingredients for the dressing
 ½ cup fresh lime juice
ï‚· 3 teaspoons fish sauce (adjust to your taste)
ï‚· 3 teaspoons brown sugar
 6 chili – finely chopped
Method:
In a large mixing bowl, mix all the dressing ingredients. Adjust the fish sauce and brown sugar to your taste, if needed. Then gently toss in the salad ingredients.
Indra’s tip: This simple recipe has the soluble fiber goodness of mango and green apple to help control cholesterol and digestion. Makes a nice refreshing side dish to Asian dishes.
This salad for me is a like a side dish to my main dish for dinner, or for those on diet, it can be eaten on its own. This is even better than eating cooked vegetables, raw fruits and vegetable is really how it was made for our body to thrive! I love the sourish taste that reminds me of Thai Mango Salad, and I do really love mangoes too.
With all these new info on hand, we got to work, picking the fruits that we want to be in our salad and match it with the toppings of our choices, there are so many types of fruits and raw vege to choose from I just wanted to add everything in!
After adding our fruits, we get to choose any of these toppings and sauces or even make our own with lemon juice and vinegar.
I decided to add 10 types of fruit into my salad, and topped it with cranberry dried fruit and chia seed with a splash of lemon juice and blueberry mayo. I call it Power 10 because eating this will give me a power surge of energy!
Even though I didn’t win the best salad contest, which was won by Fish by the way, I was still very happy with my funny looking big eyed salad, with the eyes made from lychee and blueberry.
The bloggers invited by Sidney of Bigboysoven all looking great after drinking a lot of juice and eating a lot of fruits that day.
The Avocado juice is made with Avocado + Milk + Yogurt + Dates Sweetener meant to Improve Skin complexion! It’s so easy to order juice here as the menu states what are the benefits of their juice combo, so you can just choose according to your needs.
The staffs here are super friendly and helpful, they took their precious time to calculate for me what I can buy and also recommended products that I can use for my health. After buying over RM300 products, can you imagine how heavy the plastic bags were? The staff even helped me carry it all the way to my car! Talk about great service!
Check out my haul of fruits and products that can be found at MBG, all healthy and good ones.
After over feasting on chicken last night, tonight’s dinner is going to be just fruits, mango, cherries, avocado with dried raisins and dried cranberries with sprinkles of chia seed and a teaspoon of pomegranate vinegar all from @mbgfruitshop #fruits #mbg #healthy #food #Corelle #Rosabelle A photo posted by Leona Lim (@leonalimdotcom) on
I had been having fruits for breakfast everyday since, I just mix and match them as I like and they are super delicious, filling and healthy for sure.
For more information, please logon www.mbg.com.my.