Berry Fruit Salad
This Berry Fruit Salad is an easy and healthy summer salad. A refreshing honey lime dressing takes this easy fruit salad recipe to a whole new level of deliciousness!
We make fruit salad all the time, but this one is extra special. This berry fruit salad is made with the best fresh summer fruits, including four kinds of berries and cherries.
But wait, is a cherry a berry? No, cherries are not berries. Cherries are part of a different category of fruits called drupes. These fruits have an outer flesh that surrounds a pit (peaches and plums also fall into this category). Regardless, the cherries add a delicious twist to this berry salad!
Fresh fruit salads are a favorite side dish or healthy dessert any time of year. This recipe is especially simple to make because the berries need no prep other than washing and patting them dry.
I can’t think of a meal that wouldn’t be better with this mixed berry salad on the side. It’s a perfect side dish for grilled chicken or grilled turkey burgers. Serve this berry salad with buttermilk waffles or these homemade buttermilk pancakes for breakfast. Leftover homemade berry salad makes a delicious topping for steel cut oats.
This Berry Salad is our favorite because:
- The sweet and tart honey lime dressing brings out the natural sweetness of the berries and cherries.
- You can customize this salad based on the fruits that you have on hand.
- It’s a crowd-pleasing healthy side dish or dessert that both kids and adults love!
How to Make the Best Fruit Salad
- Start with ripe, fresh fruit. When fresh berries are perfectly ripe, they are naturally sweet and juicy. I recommend buying organic berries when possible. I used strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, blueberries and cherries in this recipe for the perfect combination of colors and textures.
- Wash and dry the fruit. Rinse your fruit under cold water and lay it out on a clean towel. Gently pat the fruit dry because excess moisture will cause the berries to soften more quickly.
- Cut into bite-size pieces. Ideally, you want to get the flavors of different fruits in each bite of this berry salad. Leave the blueberries, raspberries and blackberries whole. Cut the strawberries into smaller pieces. You can halve the cherries or leave them whole, after removing the cherry pits. This cherry pitter makes it easy to remove the cherry pits.
- Drizzle on a fruit salad dressing. When you make this berry salad with fruit that is perfectly ripe, you honestly don’t need much for a sweetener or dressing. But a light drizzle of honey lime dressing makes fresh fruit salad even better.
Berry Fruit Salad Dressing
This simple fruit salad dressing is made with just three ingredients: fresh lime juice, lime zest and honey. It’s fresh, sweet and tart all at the same time. You can substitute pure maple syrup for the honey if you want a vegan fruit salad.
You’ll whisk together the dressing ingredients and then pour the dressing over the fruit. Gently toss the salad to coat all of the fruit with the syrupy dressing.
How to Keep Fruit Salad Fresh
Fruit salad is best served the day it is made. Leftovers of this berry fruit salad will keep for one day in the refrigerator.
If you want a make-ahead fruit salad, you can wash and dry the berries and cherries up to 12 hours in advance. Store the washed berries in the refrigerator. Wait and add the fruit salad dressing right before serving.
If you are making a fruit salad recipe with fruits that can brown, such as apples or bananas, wait to slice and add those fruits to the salad right before serving.
More Salad Recipes for Summer
Berry Fruit Salad
Ingredients
- 1 pound fresh strawberries
- 8 ounces fresh blueberries
- 4 ounces fresh raspberries
- 4 ounces fresh blackberries
- 2 cups fresh cherries, pitted
- zest of 1 small lime
- 1 tablespoon lime juice
- 1 tablespoon honey
Instructions
- Wash and gently dry berries and cherries; place in a large bowl.
- In a small bowl, whisk together lime zest, lime juice, and honey. Pour over fruit and toss gently to combine.
- Refrigerate until ready to serve. Fruit salad is best served the day it is made but will still be good on the second day.
Kristine, this is the most gorgeous berry salad that I’ve seen! I always head straight for these kind of dishes at parties, but have never made my own before. I’m loving all of the fresh fruit in here. I can’t get enough of blueberries this summer, and cherries, too…so this is perfect! And that dressing sounds so flavorful. What a perfect dish for the summer!
Thank you, Gayle!! I know you would love this fruit salad! We can’t get enough of it! 🙂
Can you substitute lemon for the lime
You can but it will be more tart because lemons are more sour than limes.
YES I have the dilemma about which fruit to buy so I buy it all! This is the perfect way to get it all in and I’m loving the sound of that dressing. Sounds like your summer has been a lot of fun!
Kristine, this is SO beautiful! I think berries are the best part of any fruit salad so this is right up my alley!
This fruit salad is gorgeous- colorful, refreshing, AND healthy! Love it.
Love all salads in your sites. I am a big fan of all kind of berries and this is the best salad I ever seen. Thanks for sharing, Kristine.
Thank you for the kind words, Sabrina!
FrI. Ake fruit salad quite often,but love the idea of the lime dressing. Thanks so much.
Thank you, Connie!
Wow that bowl just screams summer. Would love that super refreshing bowl as my light lunch any day!
Thank you!
I’ve added some mint but this recipe is fantastic, even without the mint! This is the second time I’ve made it. As long as the berries are available, this is my go to recipe. Thank you, Kristine, for sharing this with us! Pinning!
I’m glad you enjoy this one!
How big is one serving?
It would be 1/6 of the total fruit salad.
In the nutrition info for your salad is stated “1 gram sat fat”. Can you tell me where the sat fat is coming from?
I do not believe there is any fat in the berries, honey or lime.
Hi Marybeth,
Nutrition information is only a calculated estimated which may be rounded. Berries do have very small amounts of fat and cherries have a small amount of saturated fat.
Truly appreciate the way you made this delicious salad. Everything is so nicely described that really helped me. I am looking forward for more of such inspiring ideas in future too.
YUMMY!
This is really good – the lime honey glaze definitely adds is a nice touch. I didn’t have any cherries, but I sliced up a couple of bananas into the rest of the berries and they were good too – the lime juice keeps them from browning. I liked the little bits of green added by the lime zest so I decided to also dice up some fresh mint since I have it growing in abundance in the garden (maybe 1-2Tbsp) and added that into the glaze as well and I thought it paired nicely too – if you like mint, you might give it a try.