Filipino Dessert From My Childhood Days: Sweet Macaroni Fruit Salad

When Auntie Joe (our former Filipino maid) was working with my family, she made for my sister and I a dessert native to her country. I remembered clearly one of those desserts had macaroni as the main ingredient. And it's covered in a sweet white 'sauce'. I was only 6 years old then. It didn't occur to me that I will be craving for this dessert again in my teenage years. By then, Auntie Joe was no longer working for us. Had I known, I would have asked her for the recipe, or at least... the name of the dessert! But what do you expect from a 6 year old?!

So I tried to google for images that looked like the dessert I had in my memory and thankfully after many painstaking hours, I found the recipe I was looking for. It was extremely simple to do, but surprising to note that the dessert contained not only macaroni, but mayonnaise and condensed milk! At the sound of it, my father was immediately put off by it. But I was determined to give it a try.

I did some changes to the original recipe I found online. It called for grapes, green apples, etc. But I just kept it at a minimum: Fruit cocktails! I honestly didn't keep tabs on the quantity of each ingredients. Everything was done by taste.


Ingredients

1 can of Fruit Cocktail
2 tablespoon Mayonnaise
6 - 8 tablespoon Condensed Milk
A bunch of Elbow Macaroni

Directions

1. Cook macaroni according to package instruction. Drain and let cool.
2. Combine cooled macaroni with the rest of ingredients. Mix well.
3. Refrigerate for an hour before serving.

The dessert is now a hot favourite in the household. Would love to do this again! My father still finds it weird that one can eat macaroni with mayonnaise and condensed milk! Too bad. He doesn't know what's he's missing out on. HAHAHAHA!