Ambrosia salad: Bring back this 70s classic (2024)

There are many sides to this colourful and, dare I say it, retro salad. If you're a fan of the movie, Edward Scissorhands, you will know what I'm talking about when I utter "ambrosia salad".

Remember that giant, heaving bowl of what looked like pink snow, which Edward Scissorhands' neighbour Joyce spooned generously into Scissorhands' mouth? A hilarious scene that may be the only association some people have with ambrosia salad.

It's a Waldorf salad with candy added, I can love that once more.

I'm an 80s kid and during my childhood, our backyard had a bungalow and we had an esky to keep our beer cold in December. We even had an above-ground swimming pool, yet ambrosia salad was not something that I initially thought had made it to our family table.

However, during my research on this dish, I rummaged through some old photos of birthday parties and noticed a strange bowl sitting on a table next to my cousin's birthday cake. My family thought ambrosia was best eaten as a dessert and served it as a final course. And low and behold, there's actual evidence of me and my family scooping it up.

Ambrosia salad can be traced to the US, where the first records of this recipe date back to the 1800s. Its

is long and exasperating. It's said that theambrosia salad was invented as a three-ingredient salad (coconut, oranges and sugar) so that people in the US' southern states could utilise an abundance of oranges. Variations eventually morphed the salad into the lustrous five-cup salad plus so-called exotic fruits to signal class and money.

According to food historian Jan O'Connell, the author of

,the dish came to Australia along with other American foodafter the world wars had ended.

Other American food included the addition of pineapple to dishes like pizza, which was "helped by a great deal of editorial in the women's magazines", O'Connell says.

Coca Cola sales took off after this. And while hot dogs were eaten in Australia as early as the 1920s, and hamburgers around the 1930s, "thanks to the influence of the visiting troops, both became much more popular after World War II."

Aussie-born chef and food writer,

, remembers eating ambrosia salad, or more simply, "marshmallow salad", as a child growing up in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne. "Mum wasn't a marshmallow eater, so that meant they were a banned substance for us kids, so it would only be at other people's barbecues, fetes [and] take-a-plate parties popular in 1970s suburban Australia where I'd see them," Lepard says.

Ambrosia salads were perfect for all-you-can-eat cold buffets as it could sit there looking more or less the same for days.

Lepard thinks the ambrosia salad fell out of favour in the 1990s. "I guess to move forward we have to somewhat shun what went before, but we can rediscover it, find the good bits," he says.

"Given how many 'jellified' bits you get on top restaurant plates today, and how common it is to have fruit added to main course dishes, I don't think Ambrosia salad is so strange an idea: It's a Waldorf salad with candy added, I can love that once more."

I was lucky enough to have spent many Christmases with my friends in the US and was reintroduced to ambrosia in Kansas. With Thanksgiving just past, millions of Americans enjoyed ambrosia salad with their turkey and sweet potatoes. I know I did.

You either love the sweetness of the salad or you hate it. However, if you like cranberry sauce with turkey or apple sauce with roast pork – why not have an ambrosia salad to accompany your baked ham for Christmas?

Lead image courtesy of

This is a variation of the original ambrosia salad. It includes beetroot to give it that ruby-red Edward Scissorhands look. I've also included pecans for crunch. Sour cream makes it less sweet and raisins give it an Australian spin.

Makes 1 bowl

Ingredients

Method