General Question

redcupbluecup's avatar

What are some "sneaky" ways to incorporate more fruit into my daily diet?

Asked by redcupbluecup (87 points ) December 6th, 2009

I normally hate fruit, but the other day I discovered that apple slices on a grilled turkey sandwich with brie cheese is just awesome. It reminded me of a few other “sneaky” ways to eat fruit:

- Raisins or cranberry in a salad
– Banana slices on a PB + J sandwich

Basically, I don’t mind fruit as much as long as I incorporate it into some sort of dish that I already enjoy. What are some other ways I can “trick” myself into eating fruit?

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57 Answers

pjanaway's avatar

If you have a blender, just grind it up in there, add milk or something and drink it. :)

Sarcasm's avatar

How about juice?
I drink tons of juice.

redcupbluecup's avatar

I was thinking more about specific sandwiches, salads, or recipes that use fruit as a secondary ingredient, as opposed to the main one (which would ideally be meat, cheese, or veggies).

anon's avatar

Bananas on Weetabix = Win.

evegrimm's avatar

Find a good recipe that is lowfat and uses fruit puree or dried fruit in it—some cookies are good for this.

Carrot cake and zucchini bread (no frosting, made with applesauce and whole wheat pastry flour) are tasty and good for you too. (Admittedly, these are veggies, not fruits, but the concept is sound.) Banana bread is also tasty and yummy.

Some salads are made with grapes, raisins or mandarin oranges as one ingredient, but you could probably make that up as you go along, rather than having a recipe. If you add grilled chicken, beans or cheese, you would have a complete meal!

Allie's avatar

You can use cranberry sauce on a turkey sandwich. (Seriously, it’s way good.)
Make some ants on a log for snacks.
If you’re having pancakes or a waffle, cut up some strawberries to put on top. Or blueberries, peaches, which ever fruit you prefer.
Cut up some bananas and put it in your cereal. It’s good in a bowl of Honey Nut Cheerios.

We recently moved our fruit bowl to our kitchen table from its spot on the counter next to the toaster. Now I see the fruit bowl each time I walk inside for a snack so I’ve started to grab a piece of fruit more often (as opposed to making a bagel or something, even though I love bagels). You could try this too. Fill it with fruit you really enjoy, but might not eat enough of. Mine has a lot of bananas, pears, plums, and golden delicious apples.

figbash's avatar

Hawaiian chicken has a salsa of crushed pineapple and soy sauce – which is great. There are a lot of deli chicken salads that have fruit or grapes in them, and many salsas (like mango) are fruit-based. Keep jars of those around!

hungryhungryhortence's avatar

I like to make little apple sandwiches from thinly sliced Granny Smith sour apples and slices of Extra Sharp Cheddar cheese. If I’ve got it then sliced ham lunchmeat is yummy in there too.

avvooooooo's avatar

Fruit muffins. Chutney on a sandwich. Apple sauce in baking instead of oils. :)

I like apple salad. Cut up an apple, mix in mayo to coat, raisins and mini marshmallows. It sounds a little gross, but it tastes like yummy goodness (especially when the marshmallows are allowed to do what they do for a little while before eating.).

Sampson's avatar

Apples cut into wedges with peanut butter on them.

Blueberries or raisin in oatmeal.

DancingMind's avatar

Try your apples with peanut butter… so good! But try and use ‘natural’ pb if you don’t already (avoid the added trans fats and sugar!)
Or, and I’m not sure how much the fruit/veggies will count here, haha, but make apple cake/banana bread (w/ walnuts!) etc.
Or have a dessert of something like peaches/strawberries and cream (just don’t overdo the whipped cream, and again go for real whipped cream not whipped topping – whipped trans fats!)

Val123's avatar

Apple wedges dipped in caramel!!

laureth's avatar

I like to make a roast chicken some weekends. My stuffing recipe is: a bunch of stale bread cubes, chopped nuts (pecans or walnuts usually), dried cranberries, two or three diced peeled apples, a chopped onion, and sage. (I don’t measure, just dump.) The cranberries plump up and add a tart-sweet flavor to the stuffing without being overpowering. The apples just kind of dissolve and you can’t pick them out very well in the finished product, but it’s not the same without them (they add a lot of moisture). Yum.

Darwin's avatar

Here are a couple of recipes for fruit sandwiches (basically these are forms of “fruit butter”), in case you are a cook.

You can add grapes or chunks of apple or pineapple to any type of “salad” sandwich, such as tuna salad or chicken salad, or even ham salad. Yoiu can experiment with other fruit as well.

Also here is an interesting recipe for a fruit and cheese spread for sandwiches.

Make a fruit topping for any dessert you consume, and consider mixing fruit into oatmeal or your morning cereal or putting it on waffles or pancakes. The real thing is much better than those fake-tasting dry “crunchberries.” And as others have suggested, make smoothies. You can even add fresh fruit to yogurt.

Serve fruit with your main course—applesauce with pork chops or roast, pineapple with ham, or cranberry sauce with chicken. Consider making fruit salsas or chutneys to serve with your meal. Make a tasty fruit soup like one of these.

For a real treat, make natural fruit popsicles. You can buy a popsicle mold in some grocery stores or online. Puree fruit in the blender along with a little fat-free yogurt. Place in the molds and freeze.

Also simply try dipping fruit in a dab of sugar and then eating it as a snack. It can be really tasty. You can even make fruit into candy like this or like this or like this. And, if you like it, there is always fruit pie.

marinelife's avatar

I start with a basic muffin recipe, and then add fruit. A mashed banana and a handful of walnuts work wonders.

I slice banana or throw a handful of berries on cereal.

Applesauce is delicious with pork roast or pork chops.

Make a curry (like chicken curry) and serve chutney with it. We are having turkey curry with cranberry chutney for dinner.

Seet and sour Asian food.

jaytkay's avatar

Peanut butter and banana sandwich. Seriously wonderful.

Also, every morning I put this in the blender and drink a delicious shake:
Banana Blueberry Smoothie
Splash of orange juice
1 banana
3 tablespoons yogurt
¼ cup frozen blueberries

Haleth's avatar

A lot of middle-eastern dishes will do unusual things with flavors by incorporating fruit and nuts into a meat/ rice based dish. Here is a recipe for lamb and apricot tagine. You could also make some curry and then stir in some apricots, dates, pine nuts, almonds, etc. (Dried dates and apricots are also really good stuffed with marzipan.)

Waldorf chicken salad- chicken salad with cubed apple pieces, is also really good. Vietnamese Sweet and Sour fish soup is sooo delicious. It incorporates fresh pineapple and tomato chunks, and the broth slowly softens them. It has a really unique, delicious flavor. I also love cheese and fruit together. One of my favorite snacks is some fancy cheese with fig spread and prosciutto on crackers, and drinking that with red wine. And sometimes for breakfast, I like to cut a croissant lengthwise, toast it lightly in the toaster oven, and eat it with honey, butter, and sliced fresh strawberries. Yum!

aprilsimnel's avatar

@Haleth – lurve for tagine!

filmfann's avatar

Be careful with fruit juices. They can really raise your blood sugar levels.

sliceswiththings's avatar

Baked goods! That’s how I do veggies, it’s easy to sneak squash or beets into brownies…yum. You can substitute applesauce in recipes, and probably other fruits. Chocolate can mask anything!

Haleth's avatar

Oh yeah… this isn’t fruit-based, but avocado chocolate mousse is also sneaky and healthy.

marinelife's avatar

@Haleth Actually, although many people think of it as a vegetable, avocado is technically a fruit as are tomatoes.

avvooooooo's avatar

Puree squash and put it in mac ‘n cheese. Nobody ever knows they’re getting a dose of veggies!

I just had a frozen cranberry salad. Its awesome and tastes more than a little like ice cream. :)

seeing_red's avatar

I’m all for smoothies. omnomnom

Ailia's avatar

@redcupbluecup Why would you want to do that? If you don’t like fruit thats great, you will be healthier because of it. Fruit is very sugary and is not at all good, in terms of health, as everyone else says. I’ve been trying to wean myself off of fruit forever and yet you want to incorporate it?

TitsMcGhee's avatar

Berries in salads; strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, and raspberries are all great additions to salads, and most people like berries more than other fruits. They’re also great on ice cream, in yogurt, and in cereals or parfait. I love getting mango and kiwi on frozen yogurt too.

Darwin's avatar

@Ailia – However, despite the sugar, whole fruits contain a lot of very useful vitamins, assorted antioxidants, and plenty of fiber. In addition, the sugar in fresh fruit is fructose, which, as Wikipedia says with commendable accuracy, is…

”...broken down by the body slowly and is converted into
SUCROSE and GLYCOGEN. Fructose is often recommended for, and consumed
by, people with diabetes mellitus or hypoglycemia, because it has a
very low Glycemic Index (GI 23) relative to cane sugar.”

As this site says:

“There are differences between the different sugars. When we eat
sucrose, our bodies quickly break it down into roughly equal parts of
glucose and fructose. Glucose is the sugar our bodies use for both
physical and mental energy. When our bodies sense an increase of
glucose in the blood, it immediately directs the pancreas to push
insulin into the blood stream. With the insulin, the body is able to
burn the glucose as energy. If there’s too much glucose in the blood
stream to be used as energy, the glucose can be changed to glycogen,
the body’s short-term storage energy supply. And if the glycogen pool
is already full, the body will turn it into long term storage in the
form of fat.”

So why are you trying to get fruit out of your diet? I can see possibly trying to stop drinking so much juice because so little fiber is left in it, but fruit itself?

TitsMcGhee's avatar

Also, @redcupbluecup: was the sandwich you had the Alice (#11) from Toasties? That’s where I first found that combo – deliiiiicious.

gailcalled's avatar

Slices of apples with cheddar, grapes in chicken salad, dried cranberries or tangerine slices in a green salad, organic dark chocolate-covered raisins, prunes on oatmeal. Bake an apple in the MW and put some brown sugar or maple syrup in the hole where the core was.

redcupbluecup's avatar

@Darwin Because of your suggestion, I found an awesome recipe for tuna salad with raisins, I made it and it was quite AWESOME!!! I NEVER would have though of that, thank you!

@Ailia Thank you for enlightening me on this worldwide conspiracy of fruit being deemed healthy. I will keep this in mind.

avvooooooo's avatar

Grilled peaches with honey…. YUM!!!

emma193's avatar

Jerry Seinfeld’s wife Jessica wrote a cookbook called “Deceptively Delicious” – all about sneaking in fruits and vegetables in very creative and crazy ways into regular foods. Link to the cookbook below but a few recipes include chocolate cake with beets and brownies with spinach and carrot! I am sure she has some suggestions about sneaking fruit into recipes too.

Ailia's avatar

@Darwin You’re right, but the benefits of the vitamins, antioxidants, and fiber is not worth the sugar content. Even if the fruit has a low glycemic index, its still sugar. Besides, you can just as easily get the vitamins, antioxidants, and fiber from vegetables, and it is way healthier than fruit; although I will say that you do need to keep coconuts in your diet, they are full of nutritition. I just don’t see why anyone would want to incorporate fruit into their diet if they’re already perfectly fine without it. Its not like its going to do good for them unless they’re switching from a diet full of fats and sweets into a diet with more vegetables and fruit instead of sweets. Personally, I have been trying to wean myself of fruits for a year now, and it is hard. However in the past few weeks, I have actually managed to abstain from any fruits and I feel really good. Probably better than I have for a while.

Sarcasm's avatar

This kind of reminds me of Samurai trying to teach us about the benefits of not showering. No thanks Ailia, I’ll stick with my apparently unhealthy fruits. I wish you luck in your conquest to avoid the foods your parents should’ve taught you to enjoy.

Ailia's avatar

@Sarcasm If you want to believe fruits are amazingly healthy then go ahead. I don’t care, I’m just telling you what I’ve learned. I used to eat fruits too, my parents did teach me to enjoy them, and I can see how you think I am crazy. However it doesn’t mean you can put me down just because you don’t believe in what I am saying. Maybe not showering is the way to go, I’m not the one to judge. Try to keep an open mind, it may benefit you.

Darwin's avatar

@Sarcasm – I’m with you. I can see folks developing problems by eating only fruit, but not the recommended amount of fresh fruit.

avvooooooo's avatar

@Ailia Your ideas are not nutritionally sound. I’m not sure what you learned, nor where from, but what you’re saying is contrary to both common and scientific knowledge. That is where the doubt comes in. Its not about having an open mind, its about proven knowledge over theory.

redcupbluecup's avatar

Yes @Ailia not to add to this pile-on but I am a bit curious to know exactly where you are getting this information. Because as someone who generally dislikes fruit, if I could retain a completely balanced diet without ever having to eat it, I really would. But I have a hard time believing this.

Here is what the USDA has to say about fruit on their site:

Keep in mind when I asked this question, it doesn’t mean I’m trying to eat an abundant amount of fruit. Just get a little bit more fruit into my daily routine. Which at the moment is none at all – which I’m sure would bring a frown to any doctor or dietitians face.

Ailia's avatar

@avvooooooo Just because my knowledge isn’t common knowledge does not mean it isn’t true. Besides, proven knowledge over theory does not cut it in my book. There are many cases when scientific knowledge was proven wrong. And how do you know my “idea” is not nutritionally sound? Have you ever even tried not eating fruit for a long period of time? It might benefit you. Unless you’re a qualified nutrionist and you have studied nutrition for a while, your arguments don’t hold much weight. Just because you believe in what the fda and usda tells you doesn’t mean its true. @redcupbluecup If I were you I would stick to your regular diet. The USDA is just in it for the money. They only care about promoting the interests of farmers, not exactly are our health.

avvooooooo's avatar

@Ailia Unless you’ve taken many nutrition classes or are a nutritionist, I’m not quite sure where your supposed authority comes from. I’m not a nutritionist. But I have taken classes. I happen to know that there are several things that are best received through ingestion of fruit, that’s what my nutritionist teacher tested me on among other things. Just because you believe a theory of not eating fruit doesn’t mean its true.

If the USDA is only in it for the money, how do you reconcile the fact that the similar agencies for many governments and organizations say the same thing with your conspiracy theory?

Sarcasm's avatar

@Ailia, where exactly are you getting these facts regarding the unhealthiness of fruit?

Darwin's avatar

@Ailia – So this is your own idea? Have you put it under rigorous scientific testing? Published the results in a peer-reviewed journal? Discussed it with members of the medical and nutritional communities? If not, then don’t declare it is the truth, the whole truth, and the only truth.

Ailia's avatar

@avvooooooo Its not a theory, theres research to back it up. And just because similar agencies say the same thing does not mean they are telling the truth, maybe they just don’t know. Besides, those agencies need to keep fruit in the interests of people. If they don’t then people might stop buying fruit and that would hurt an entire industry. Which, especially under these economic times, would not be good.
@Darwin This is most definitely not my “idea” and it has been tested. I wish I could eat lots of fruit and still be wonderfully healthy but thats not the case. Fruit is one of the those things you should only eat sparingly and here is some information to back it up. This information has also been tested by Dr. Robert Young . Here are two sources:

If you look for fruit in what they’re saying, then you will see that they’re saying fruit isn’t all that its cracked up to be. However, this does not mean that you have to change your eating style, even though I did. Its just something to keep in mind. Because I know most of you are still going to love fruits anyways and probably think the same as you did before. But if you don’t agree then, fine, its not a big deal. At least its not as bad as alcohol or cocaine, right?

laureth's avatar

Frankly, the way most Americans eat, fruit would be an improvement. To say fruit is bad in general would be letting people off the hook to keep eating the McDonald’s menu with a side of KFC. Once they are eating less processed, more whole foods, vegetables, whole grains, less meat, etc., then we can probably tell them to eat less fruit and fill that void with better vegetables, if that’s true – but until then, eating fruit would appear to be a sound, sensible idea for most of the American public.

Darwin's avatar

I quote from the first of @Ailia‘s sources:

“Dr. Robert O. Young’s New Biology™, most simply stated, is that the over-acidification of the body is the single underlying cause of all disease.

In contrast, the old biology, based on the work of Louis Pasteur in the late 1800s, stems from the idea that disease comes from germs which invade the body from the outside.”

BTW, the above was written by Dr. Young himself. He is not a medical doctor at all, and has been charged two third-degree felony counts of practicing medicine without a license (plea-bargained down to a reduced misdemeanor charge).

His dietary advice relies on live blood analysis. Live blood analysis lacks scientific foundation, and has been described as a fraudulent means of convincing patients to buy dietary supplements and a medically useless “money-making scheme”.

This article summarizes the scientific lack of validity for the alkaline diet model.

As to the second, whether you accept the idea of food becoming ash in the body, and health relying on acid-base balance or not, it does not say don’t eat fruit. It says “our diet should consist of at least 70 to 80 percent basic foods – that is, no more than 20 to 30 percent acidifying foods,” fruit being one of the acidifying foods. In other words, do eat fruit, but also eat other foods.

gailcalled's avatar

@Darwin: I did notice that in his purported autobiography, he listed his favorite musicians but not his education. He also is hawking lots of expensive products “to make the program more efficient.” Buyer beware.

Sarcasm's avatar

@Ailia I find it interesting that both of your sources are both websites run by the same couple, Robert and Shelly Young. At least, that’s what the “About us” is leading me to believe. Unless those websites are both just talking about their favorite people in the world, instead of talking about themselves.

Darwin's avatar


With some people there is no difference.

strange1's avatar

try strawberry wrapped in bacon kebab!

gailcalled's avatar

Raisins covered with organic dark chocolate can hardly be classified as fruit, but they are delicious.

strange1's avatar

@gailcalled lol depends how many raisins you cover in chocolate

gailcalled's avatar

One raisin at a time is dipped.

strange1's avatar

oh i thought you meant the bar

PooperDood's avatar

A fruit smoothie!!!


1 banana (fresh or frozen)
1 cup-½ cup strawberries, peaches, blueberries, pineapple, mix n’ match!
A couple spoonfuls yogurt (it’s best to use plain yogurt, not fat-free or low-fat, with natural sweeteners)
Ground flax seed or hemp seed (for fiber, EFA’s, and a little protein)
Water, milk, or apple juice.

I would stay away from adding juice because it’ll spike your blood sugar. Just get the sweetness from the fruit!

PooperDood's avatar

P.S. It is ridiculous to eliminate fruit from your diet.

avvooooooo's avatar

@Ailia So you post two things from the same qackery and you think that we should believe you? Not happening. There is no scientific basis for what you think is true that is contrary to what other people know is true. It is a theory and a crackpot one at that.

MarthaStewart's avatar

I cooked for a daycare center years ago that had some kids that wouldn’t knowingly touch fruit or veggies. When I made muffins for them, they were ⅓ fresh diced apple. I also added diced apple to chicken or tuna salad. I never had any complaints. For grown ups, I love an applesauce-based curry.

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