Salads with Dried Cherries

Dried cherries, now considered as the emerging Wonder Fruit, offer a variety of advantages to us. Aside from being delicious, dried cherries are also nutritious and can aid in various health therapies. This little dried fruit contains a lot of antioxidants, almost enough to battle unwanted occurrences of diarrhea, arthritis, heart conditions and even cancer, at the same time delaying the negative effects of aging, such as memory loss and frail neurological functioning. It can also be a good supplement in dealing with jet lag, sleep apnea and other sleep-related disorders.

This dried fruit product also gives us a wide array of recipes to cook and prepare. Its sweet and tangy flavor is most suitable as an ingredient when making desserts, cookies, sauces, puddings, meat stuffing among others. Most probably, the easiest dish to prepare among the dried cherry menu is salad.

The most common salads are the plain vegetable salad, pasta salad, and mixed salad (meat, fruit and vegetables). While these salads are, of course, delicious in their own little way, adding dried cherries could be a great twist on your dish and a good satisfaction on your palate! Dried cherries are already a known ingredient in making salads. Aside from the taste, salad meals with dried cherries are also perfect for people who are observing a healthy diet. A single serving of dried cherries (33 g) is equivalent to a single serving of a fruit. The U.S. Department of Agriculture suggests having four to five fruits per day. Dried cherry-enhanced salads are more nutritious and, therefore, healthier for you.

You can do a lot of salads using dried cherries. Recipes are available online and in any salad-related cook books. Some of the salads where you can include dried cherries are spinach salad, wheat berry salad, grilled pork/couscous salad, chicken salad, and orzo salad.

Spinach Salad with dried cherries. This is an easy to prepare salad. You just have to beat mustard, vinegar, and oil together until it becomes thick. When done, add some salt and pepper. And then, you can put your spinach, dried cherries, and onions. You can top it off with toasted pumpkin seeds.

Wheat Berry and Dried Cherries Salad. The sweetness of the dried cherries plays a crucial role in this salad. To prepare, you can cook wheat and dried cherries with some peas and soy sauce in a honey salad dressing made with vinegar, oil, salt, pepper and seasonings.

Grilled Pork/Couscous/ Dried Cherries Salad. This salad is a little more complicated than the first two. Mix cumin and some spices like ginger, garlic powder, and allspice. Rub this over your pork cubes. Grill the cubes for 8-10 minutes. While grilling, you can pour the couscous with boiling water that is stirred with 1/2 tsp. of salt. After 5 minutes, mix the dried cherries and onion in the couscous. You can serve it and the grilled pork cubes with cucumber and orange slices. The dressing can be done by mixing orange juice, olive oil, brown sugar, salt, and pepper.

Chicken Salad with Dried Cherries. You can prepare this by combining cooked and diced chicken breasts, dried cherries, nuts, celery, mayonnaise, buttermilk, salt, and pepper. Refrigerate and serve with wheat bread.

Orzo pasta Salad with Dried Cherries. Orzo is a type of pasta with a shape like that of rice, and is also known as risoni. Put some orzo pasta in boiling salted water for about 8 to 10 minutes. Drain and make sure that all moisture is removed. Sprinkle it with 3 tbsp. olive oil. Stir and toss it well. When already cool, add dried cherries, some salad herbs, basil, nuts, lemon juice, salt and pepper.

Of course, there are still more dried cherries recipes that you can try. Other common recipes include blanched vegetable salads with dried cherry, turkey dried cherry pasta salad, and Gorgonzola salad with dried cherries.