Food-Themed Decoration At Home

[SauceSupreme]

What kind of food-themed decoration does your home have?

I've got a framed poster of an old wine vintage label, and I'm about to frame some food photographs of which I am quite proud.

[SweetPea914]

I really like pineapples. They are a sign of hospitality dating back to the 1500's. Growing up we often vacationed in Newport RI, and this is what I was told about the use of pineapples, which you see very often there...

"the pineapple tale purports that when colonial sea captains returned from their travels, they often displayed a pineapple at their door or upon their gates as a sign that they were home and welcoming friends to their hearth for food and drink and good company."

[cayjohan]

Swee'P, I also like pineapples. My father was a sailor, and others in his family. One uncle carved a pineapple for my kitchen. We listen to the sailing tales and appreciate the symbolism of the pineapple. Good citation!

[SweetPea914]

We have a lot of sailors in my family too!
I don't know which I like more. The symbolism behind the pineapple or the fact that they remind me of relaxing summers sitting by the water eating seafood with friends and family!

[MMRuth]

I also think that I've read that the pineapple was put out after the returning sailor had spent "personal time" with his family - the setting out of the pineapple was then the sign, as you said, that the family was "at home" to visitors.

[jillp]

Jackp already owned some great original food art when I met him, and at that time I didn't like most food. Bless his prescience!

We have several vintage copies of Gourmet that I am about to take apart just so I can frame the covers; Jackp's mother saved them for decades and passed them along to us. She also passed along some swell framed prints of fruit that are on my dining room walls, and of course I have my bookcase full of cookbooks as decoration, too.

This year he came back from a trip out of town with a couple of vintage fruit labels. When we were in DC recently, I picked up another print. I am pretty much out of wall space in my kitchen, but that's okay.

Just this evening I was thinking that I have more interesting art in my kitchen than most people have in their entire house.

[cayjohan]

jillp, it's great to hear of those keeping art in their kitchen! When we spend so much time there, why not? We have a wooden ceiling in the kitchen, and we mount paintings on it ( we have a lot of artists in the family and only so much wall space, as you noted...our other walls are full up as well; oh well)). Vintage Gourmet covers sound wonderful! Consider the ceiling!

[aussiewonder]

My mum had my cork collection made into a cork board for my office, not exactly original except there's a good 10 years of history as many of them are signed or dated by the parties who enjoyed them and it's a nice 'buzz' to review them fondly.

I also have all of my granny's old kitchen scales and bowls adorning the tops of the cabinets. this is partly a space saver and also for display.

and, as other's have posted i have bowls/vases/mojacetes around filled w/ seasonal produce.

[stellamystar]

in my catering days, we would decorate out 'tablescape' with tall glass vases (three, always) and fill them with colorful hearty vegetables or fruit - lemons, peppers, limes, small squash, etc, etc. Of course, use them after not to be wasteful (at home, anyway).

I also love glass milk bottles (old ones) to put flowers or basil in

[cayjohan]

We actually "decorate" with the food itself. This time of year, it's hard not to, given our love of the farmer's markets and relative lack of storage for our bounty! On a practical note, it's helpful having the produce out as a visual reminder that we have to tackle the tyranny of the vegetables and get cooking. On a quasi-pagan-harvest-worship level, it's really satisfying to see the abundance. The crazy romanesco cauli/broc. hybrid (love this vegetable, visually) as a centerpiece, the Gothic cathedral-like spires of Brussels sprouts propped in a big vase. The pretty little jars of fresh herbs on the counter. The stereotypical bowl of apples. A big basket of squash on the cool porch. Even a colander full of potatoes wating for peeling makes a lovely visual, and the earthyiness of the aroma seems to say Yes, we are lucky to have all this food.

It's not just decor; we eat all of it. But it's just so gorgeous to look at and mull over what one will make next.

[Chew on That]

We have a whole bowl of those fake fruits made out of paper meche (sp?): grapes...watermelon...banana...pumpkin, even a loaf of bread! It's a pretty nice decoration :)

[Miss Needle]

On my countertop is a cake stand where I arrange my fruit. We also have a huge wooden bowl filled with business cards of restaurants we've been to. And I'm thinking about getting a wall-mounted wine rack to store some wine bottles that DH likes to leave around the apartment because they mean a lot to him. We also display our Reidel Sommelier glasses as art on top of our wine fridge.

[chef4hire]

I have an entire wall dedicated to pumpkins...

[hrhboo]

The entire floor of my apartment is made up of several thousand wine corks laid side by side and covered in transparent laminate panels.

Okay, that's just wishful thinking but I do have a couple hundred issues of Gourmet and Saveur that are currently subbing for a coffee table.

[MMRuth]

Love the image of the magazines - I used to have them stacked eveywhere, but finally now have room to store them on the top shelf of a book case. But, my nightstand and the floor next to it are "decorated" with cookbooks.

[hrhboo]

I've been collecting them for years and can't bring myself to part with a single issue. Someday I'll find a better place for them!

Cookbooks make wonderful decorations, I love seeing them in peoples' homes.

[MMRuth]

I have Gourmet going back to about 1991 - the only magazine I've saved. I made the mistake at one point of tearing out the indices in the back to save them in one place, and promptly lost them.

[MMRuth]

I collect pre-Victorian English china, and so you'll find a lot of pieces scattered around my home. My side board has a selection of mostly blue and white Spode.

Edit - on second thought - this is, I guess more remotely food related, but I suppose dishes count. The piece on the table with the lemons is an early 19th Century Spode cake dish that has become the repository for our extra produce. I also have old quinine and bottles scattered about in my kitchen, but it is so small that the cookbooks and pots and pans have to end up serving as decoration in and of themselves!

[MMRuth]

Another photo -

[purple goddess]

I have hand-painted recipe boards that double as place mats, except I have pinned them to a wall in my kitchen.

I also collect food porn from calenders and books and pin it to a wall for inspiration...

http://agoddessinthekitchen.blogspot....

I like to display weird ingredients and spices on my kitchen shelves and I collect old kitchen equipment, like grinders and drop-scone pans.

[othervoice]

I was a collector of menus for many years and I made a large collage out of them and hung it in my dining room. It received many compliments throughout the years.

[ericalloyd]

found some vintage canned veggie labels at an antique store near cannery row in monterey. we had them framed and they hang in our kitchen. i have a large collection of old jadeite glass kitchenware on display behind a glass doored cabinet in our kitchen.