A Fruit Salad—With Dressing and Everything

There are fruit salads: strawberry, blueberry, kiwi, honeydew, cantaloupe, brown banana (or maybe: cantaloupe, honeydew, pineapple).

And then there are salads with fruit:

But what we seem to be missing is an entirely-fruit salad that’s treated like a salad, with a dressing and garnishes. It might seem counterintuitive to try for this in the winter, but—breaking news—we have fruit: pomegranates and pears, apples and citrus of all stripes.

And the sturdy fruits of right now can hold up after they're cut, especially when citrus graces the bounty, and they can withstand a big ol’ dressing. A creamy one, even—and one that doesn't steer the salad closer to ambrosia or a Waldorf salad or, oh boy, Jello salad.

The dressing here has tahini and coconut milk, a streamlined version of Sarah Britton’s Enlightened Tahini Sauce. It's probably been stripped of its enlightenment, but it makes something that nears a fruit salad with substance—that’s not just fruit or fruit hiding behind a lettuce leaf.

Welcome to the world, fruit salad!