Interesting way to serve fruit for party

[hcgudmun]

I am looking for a "fresh" way to serve fruit that will be passed around at a party.
Any ideas?
Thanks,
Hayley

[lgss]

Have you seen the Play With Your Food books and calendars?

[skim]

For a wedding I catered, I cut a melon in half to serve as the base. I then threaded colorful fruit on skewers (grapes, pineapple chunks, strawberry halves, etc) and stuck the skewers into the melon. It ended up looking like a fruit satellite and was really kind of beautiful.
I wish I had a photo to show you!

[Emme]

if coconut is available near you, coconut shells/cups would be great for housing fruit

you could also have fun doing a "FRUIT TRIFLE" in a big glass dish or even a ewer, so that the stripes are readily apparent and there's a fun to eating down the layers to get to the next... you could also pass with some plain yogurt (sweetened or not), but i wouldn't put it in the trifle because it'll obscure the gorgeousness of the layers/stripes.

[etoiles]

Fruit salsa with cinnamon chips is always a hit whenever I have served it at a party and it is a fresh way to serve it:

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Annies-F...

[HillJ]

Cut a navel orange about 1/2 inch from the top, scoop out the fruit segments and dice into bite sized pieces. To the shell add the orange segments, plus fresh pineapple bits, diced kiwi and splash a bit of Amaretto over the fruit. These fruit cups can be made ahead and held in the hand to enjoy.

You can adapt the fruit to what the market offers seasonally but my friends and family love it.

[soypower]

-Fruit kabobs with optional yogurt dipping sauce
-Fruit cocktail - fruit cut into bite size pieces, sprinkled w/ sugar and sparkling wine - or lemon lime soda. top with mint leaves. serve in martini classes with cocktail toothpicks that have grapes speared on them
-Fruit "bruschetta" - cut apples into thick slices and top with chopped fruit dressed in some sort of balsamic sauce.

[danhole]

I went to a bridal shower where they alternated fruit and cheese on a kabob with mint leaves for a decorative touch. Very lovely and easy to eat. I also like HillJ's idea about the orange fruit cups.

[HillJ]

Thanks for the compliment, danhole. This time of year if you can track down honeybells, they work the best as "cups"...grapefruits, altho larger, actually work horribly (skins too thin). Sans the Amaretto-I send my kids to school with fruit cups fairly often.

[Diane in Bexley]

You can't pass this around but I watched a segment of the Barefoot Contessa recently where Ina was doing a cocktail party. One of her decorator friends made 2 fruit topiaries - 1 was a styrofoam golf ball shape covered with beautiful strawberries impaled with wooden toothpicks on a stick in a large cermic pot. The second was also a round styrofoam shape, but imaled with assorted types of fruit.. They did not appear to be hard to make. If you do this, please post a picture and report back. We are having a spring graduation party for DD and thinking of doing this as opposed to the usual watermelon boat.

[alkapal]

did she glue on some green leaves to cover the ball?

[Diane in Bexley]

No, the strawberries and other fruit were impaled on tootpicks driven into the styrofoam ball. If you have ever seen a TV commercial for the Edible Fruit Arrangement, it looks like that. I would suggest trying it first. Would imagine styrofoam could be re-used. What we didn't get to see was what this looked like when 1/2 or 3/4 of fruit was gone.

[alkapal]

yep, that's what i was thinking, too. it might be cute to use some food-safe paint, and create a pattern on the styro, so that when it has been picked over, it is not ugly-bugly.

[LisaN]

Stick the skewers into a half of a red or green cabbage

[HillJ]

LisaN, cut cabbage has an odor I wouldn't want with fresh fruit.

[LisaN]

Now that I thought about it, its a half a head of iceberg that is always in the bottom of the edible arragnements.

[HillJ]

Nice, neutral iceberg lettuce makes alot more sense to me too.

[alkapal]

i'd be neat to use the whole head on a topiary pole, 'planted" in a cute flower pot, where the "dirt" is covered by parsley. or use oreo cookie crumbs.

being sure, of course, to properly weight the bottom to avoid "tippage."

[HillJ]

Examples of this, including the use of fresh herb plants, can be food in photos appearing throughout tastespotting....visual inspiration!

[alkapal]

boy, this is pretty: http://www.bhg.com/holidays/christmas...

but i don't think it is meant for eating. i wouldn't want to see it picked bare!

[HillJ]

could you imagine a guest pulling a part a centerpiece like this to eat a pear...oh my...I would be mortified.

[HillJ]

Crazy but true....we tea stain styrofoam with teabags to color it and it works great.

[alkapal]

hillj, i'll bet food coloring would work, too.

[HillJ]

big bottle! messy.

[alkapal]

it takes a big bottle of coloring, is that it?

[HillJ]

oh yeah! Around my area food coloring comes in tiny little bottles unless you go commercial supply store...and buy large bottles, powder or gels

[alkapal]

yep, i know the pointy-topped four to a package food coloring. mccormick's? http://www.associatedcontent.com/arti... i haven't bought food coloring in a zillion years.

[NWKate]

I cut a pineapple in half through the leaves and carefully separate the fruit from the shell leaving the shell intact. I cube the pineapple and place it back in the shell and surround this with sprigs of green and red grapes. Pretty easy, visually attractive and easy to serve!