snackmade: ambrosia

Quite some time ago, I promised a new snack category for recipes, snackmade. Enfin! Le début.

I recently went to an urban barbecue and brought my summer-time pot-luck standard, ambrosia. It’s not fancy and it’s not gourmet, but people love it, even if they are fancy and gourmet. Ambrosia’s one of those fluid recipes, with a million variations. It’s more of a concept, combining canned fruit and marshmallows and letting it meld together in puffy sweetness. Below is my crowd-pleasing recipe. Some would argue that ambrosia requires fruit cocktail or nuts or whipped cream. Some say that it’s technically a "salad", while some call it dessert. Indeed, there are no wrong answers. I like to try to keep a one-to-one ratio of fruit to marshmallow, and use equal volumes of each fruit.

Recipe after the jump.

1 10-ounce package mini-marshmallows

1 20-ounce can crushed pineapple, drained

2 11-ounce cans mandarin oranges, drained

2 bananas, peeled and sliced

1 cup shredded coconut

2 cups sour cream

2 10-ounce jars maraschino cherries, drained

In a large mixing bowl, combine all the ingredients except cherries. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate six hours or overnight. Just before serving, mix in cherries.

I do not know how long this will keep in the fridge, because there is never any left over.