Fancy Fruit for Three-Year-Olds

My friend Sara Jane is nuts. Really, she’s certifiable. Yesterday we attended her daughter’s third birthday party, held at her home for a few friends and relatives. Sara Jane smartly assigned a sister-in-law the task of herding the cats, er, playing some games with the little ones, so that she herself could focus solely on the food. THE FOOD. THE COPIOUS, DIZZYING, AMAZING amounts of food. She had cheesy potatoes, mac and cheese, brats, sausages, hot dogs, two kinds of cheese dip, every hot dog topping imaginable, various drinks, and, of course, chocolate cake and ice cream. And all of that sound pretty reasonable until you are starting to leave and you notice there are four more pans of macaroni and cheese and potatoes in her double ovens, and there are still more hot dogs and sausages cooking on the grill. For Sara Jane, it’s about volume.

Everyone loves to eat at Sara Jane’s house. But that goes without saying.

So when Sara Jane told me what she was having, I suggested I bring some fruit and/or vegetables. But you know, kids don’t eat vegetables. At least, most of the ones I know don’t eat them. I know, I know. We need to try harder. YOUR kid eats broccoli every meal and BEGS you for more green beans. Nonetheless, this was a party, and SJ decided that at this party, the food would be stuff kids like. Hence, the cheesy cornucopia.

So, fruit. I was bringing fruit. And I knew that SJ would have scads of other food, so volume wasn’t a priority for me. What I wanted was fruit that kids might really eat, that would contribute to the theme of “stuff they really like.” I thought about fruit kabobs with yogurt dip but that seemed messy. But the kabob seemed like a good idea – you know, food that comes on a sharp object for poking the kid next to you with – always a good plan.

So I decided to try my hand at a fruit bouquet. Couldn’t be easier, and the kids did seem to think it was pretty neat. This is something you can do with whatever fruit your kids like. I picked pineapple (because I love it), strawberries, grapes, clementines, and cantaloupe based on my knowledge of the kids I knew would be in attendance. Plus, pretty colors.

I had a short cylinder vase left over from my wedding, so in the bottom I put about four clementines and two limes (for color) in the bottom of the vase.

Next, I thought about how my skewers should look. I wanted some “flowers,” so I cleaned a half a cantaloupe and cut it in half again and laid the piece face-down on a cutting board, and I used two sizes of flower cookie cutters to slice out some shapes.

I had purchased already cleaned pineapple which was cored, so I couldn’t thread a skewer through the middle of those, so I made them into letter “O’s” and threaded the skewers up through them. Then I just added grapes and strawberries to make everything festive. After I poked all the skewers into the clementines in the bottom of the vase, I added in a few more on the top that would be easily retrievable if people wanted to eat them.

Truly, I didn’t really have a plan, but it turned out great.

http://www.lawrence.com/users/meganstuke/photos/2012/jan/9/227920/

This is one of those things you think you have to buy from an expensive retailer, because surely it is very hard to do. But it’s not true. Granted, mine might not have looked quite as professional as the ones you see in magazines or tv, but hey, the three-year-olds thought it was pretty nifty. It only took me a few minutes to put together (especially since I cheated and bought already cleaned pineapple) and it traveled well because of the wide base of the vase I chose.

This is one of those things you can do if you want to look like you slaved a long time and you want a lot of wow-factor but you don’t have a lot of time to spend chopping, dicing, baking, mixing, stirring, and cleaning up. It’s a quick and simple thing, and it’s especially good for kids and parties. Plus, healthy and delicious. WINNING!