This is a watermelon heart. Isn’t it yummycute? Don’t you just want to just sink your teeth into it? Well, how about biting into a whole bouquet?

This was an edible arrangement that Mama and I worked on. It was for a “Meet The Baby” Party (yes, I found out that there are such things) for Maxwell, my new nephew. I offered to help his grandma whose assignment was to provide fresh fruit for the guests. Instead of just heaping some fruit onto a platter, it was a chance for me to see if I could swing making an actual eatable bouquet. 

Mind you, edible arrangements like this are nothing new. In fact, a company called just that—Edible Arrangements—has built a successful business arranging and delivering these sweet bouquets. I’ve sent many to friends on birthdays and special occasions. But I’ve always thought that if I only had an excuse (and the time), I could study how the fruit is prepared and try to make one myself.

Here are some of the steps and tips, if you’d like to try your hand at making one for an upcoming baby/bridal shower or party.

YOU WILL NEED

·      baskets

·      weights (I used plastic bottles filled with water.)

·      floral foam

·      parsley for “grass/greenery”

·      wooden skewers in different lengths

·      lollipop sticks (read my note about this later)

·      steel cookie cutters in different shapes and sizes

·      dark and white dipping chocolate, if you’d like to include chocolate-dipped fruit in your bouquet

·      fruit

       Non-mushy fruit works best. (Save those bananas for muffins!)

       No apples because they’ll turn brown when exposed to air.

       We worked with:

             -     pineapple

             -     miniature pears

             -     strawberries

             -     grapes of all colors

             -     oranges

             -     cantaloupe

             -     honeydew

             -     watermelon

             -     large mutant blackberries that we found at the fruit market

PREP N’ STEPS

1)   Prep fruit by washing and drying individually. Be patient! This can get a bit tedious, especially with grapes and berries. Put on some 80’s music and just enjoy yourself.  :)

2)   Dip some fruit pieces in your melted dipping chocolate. My favorite is orange segments in dark chocolate and strawberries in white. Leave on racks to dry (strawberries) or wax paper (orange segments) while you do the rest.

3)   Put some weights at the bottom of your basket. This is so that the basket stays put when guests pull out the fruit. You can use clean rocks or bricks, depending on how large your basket is.

4)   Cover your weights with a kitchen towel to level the surface a bit and line with floral foam cut to size. The foam is very forgiving and you can cut all sorts of shapes to fill corners and pockets. Make small holes in the foam by twisting in the tip of a pair of scissors into it and staggering the holes throughout. “Plant” your parsley in these holes and in any gaps in the foam (start from the outside edge and make your way to the middle).

5)   While you’re prepping your basket, you hopefully would have coerced/cajoled/convinced a friend or family member to start cutting up the fruit. This way, you can start assembling the bouquet by sticking the fruit into the foam as the shapes are being made.

Some tips:

-     No need to peel the pineapple, just cut into rounds and into shapes by firmly pressing down on your cookie cutters.

-     Make sure round, flat pieces are not too thin, otherwise, they’ll slide down your skewers.

-     For tricky shapes, make crescents. We did this for the honeydew and cantaloupe because some were too narrow to cut big shapes out of.

-     Top off a pineapple flower with a grape “center.” The different colors together on one stick make the pieces more interesting to look at.

-     Work from the center of your bouquet outwards, with taller pieces in the middle.

-     Lollipop sticks are safer for kids because of their blunted ends, but remember that these will start to bend after about half an hour because they start absorbing the juice from the fruit. Either snip off the pointed ends from wooden skewers or serve the arrangement right away.

-     Position heavier fruit lower to the foam, on the outer edges of the arrangement.

Here are the two baskets we put together, one for kids with fun duck, cowboy and cactus shapes and another for the young-at-heart.

I hope they inspire you to plant pots of blooming fruit of your own! :)