Using summer fruit to make food art

If you miss my previous posts on food art, you can see them here, here and here. I’ve been taking enough photos of our growing food art collection to share a few more with you today.

Grape stems are a great medium for food art. Here are a few masterpieces we came up with:

The grape and bean dog

Food art: grape and bean dog

The happy grape man

Food art: happy grape man

The run-for-your-life grape man

Food art: run for your life grape man

If you go to Olive Garden, you can make Batman out of one of their breadsticks.

Food art: Batman with Olive Garden breadstick

Hey, Mama, what’s for dinner? Fishsticks. Check!

Food art: fishstick check mark

We found this awesome Yoda watermelon head at a birthday party we went to. If you know a Star Wars fan, you should try it.

Food art: Yoda head made with watermelon

Finally, I found this photo online the other day and thought it’d be a great addition to this food art post. For this last food art creation, I present you nature’s masterpiece: the duckmato.

Food art: duckmato

More food art! Do you know the muffin man?

If you missed my previous food art posts, you may want to go back to them for a little background history (a variety of food art, including several animals, and popcorn art).

Now that you’re caught up, I’d like to introduce you to the muffin man. The REAL muffin man. Souplantation is my favorite restaurant and that’s where he resides. He’s a blueberry muffin man and he’s got a new song, which goes like this (come on, sing with me!):

“Do you know the muffin man, the muffin man, the muffin man?”
“Do you know the muffin man, who lives at Souplantation?”

Here he is! Isn’t he gorgeous? I love the hat, the big eyes, the cute button nose and the slight smile!

Do you know the muffin man? Souplantation blueberry muffin.

He tasted really good by the way, although he left a bitter aftertaste in my mouth as I wondered how much I could have sold him on eBay… How do you like meeting the real muffin man?

But wait, we’re not done! Here’s a bonus food art masterpiece. I managed to create this one on a weekday morning, as I was buttering some toast for my kid. As soon as I plopped the butter on the toast, I knew something wasn’t right. I had a not so happy face staring at me. Some people get the face of Jesus on their toast, I get Mr. Grouchy. So I took its picture and decided to post it on the internet to teach it a lesson. On top of that, my son ate it.

The not so happy face on toast

Do you collect food art? Can you beat my muffin man?

Hungry for a snack? How about some popcorn art?

You may have noticed I didn’t do a WWW Wednesdays update yesterday. There’s a simple reason for it. I’m still reading the same book and I feel like the slowest reader on the planet right now. I’ve been going to bed so late every night recently (a terrible habit to start), I just want to turn off the light and go to sleep when I get there.

If you enjoyed my recent post of food art and it left you hungry for more, don’t despair. I have just the right fix for you. Have you ever made popcorn at home? Have you ever looked at those popped kernels before you shoved them down your throat nibbled on them while watching a movie?

Believe it or not, all these corn kernels pop in different ways and if you look at them carefully, you may recognize some familiar shapes in them. If you’ve ever looked for shapes in the clouds the same way I love to, you may enjoy this game a lot the next time you make some popcorn yourself. Just make sure you pick through your own bowl only, not your neighbor’s. I know, it’s tempting when you’re searching for shapes…

Here are a few shapes my kids and I recently spotted while snacking on popcorn. For the visually / spatially / creatively impaired (pick one, you know who you are!), I added some visual clues thanks to Photoshop’s paint brush, so you can see what we saw.

Ready to play the game? Here we go! Scroll down slowly so you can guess. No cheating!

Can you guess what this shape is? I’ll give you a clue. It’s an animal that walks very slowly.

Popcorn art – guessing the shape in the popcorn kernel

It’s a turtle! Don’t believe me? See it for yourself.

Popcorn art – a turtle

Don’t despair if you didn’t get it, it takes some practice. Now that you understand how to play the game, let’s continue, shall we? I’m not going to give you a hint for this one because it’s easy to guess, but I’ll tell you a lot of kernels pop this way.

Popcorn art – each kernel pops differently

Alright, just in case you couldn’t figure out, here’s the answer: it’s an octopus.

Popcorn art – an octopus

The next shape is a little similar to the previous one, at least when it comes to the number of limbs. This is the only clue you’ll get from me.

Popcorn art- seeing animal shapes

If you said spider, you’re right!

Popcorn art – spider

Alright, now that you’re warmed up, here is a more difficult one. This animal also “walks” very slowly.

Popcorn art – finding shapes in popcorn

It was a little harder but if you said snail, you’re really good at this game.

Popcorn art – snail

Here’s the last popcorn kernel for you to guess. It’s often described as a loyal animal.

Popcorn art – seeing animal shapes in popcorn kernels

If you guessed dog, give yourself a cookie!

Popcorn art – dog

How did you like this game? Will you give it a try next time you have popcorn? It’s fun playing with food, believe me.

By the way, if you want to take photos of your popcorn art and you’re smarter than me, you’ll want to put your kernel shapes on black or colored paper, so they stand out from the background. Just saying…

Impromptu post: and now for something completely different

Well, at least one of you was impressed with the reindeer food art I created with my kids and featured in my recent WordPress Weekly photo challenge on “happy”. When I mentioned to her in the comments section that we often “play” with our food, she wanted to see more. She even gave me a fun opportunity to do it by suggesting me to participate in the Weekly Writing Challenge: And Now For Something Completely Different.

So now you can blame thank Nancy at Spirits Light The Way for this so-silly-it’s-awsome post on… FOOD ART! And this time, I’ll only mention food art I actually meant to create, not the results of my klutziness like this spilled yogurt masterpiece.

Food art: yogurt bunny with spilled yogurt

Of course, kids shouldn’t play with their food instead of eating. My kids are good at putting food in their mouths rather than screw around with it. But when we eat out, I find ways to keep them quiet and occupied, especially when they’re done with their meal and I haven’t finished my salad yet. We like to play with words so we often make up jokes, stories, or look for words that rhyme. And sometimes we play with our food.

Grape stems are quite a challenge, because they can contain so many little stems, it’s hard to see shapes in them. But some of them are less cluttered, so it helps. Here are a few examples of what you can do with grape stems. Unfortunately I don’t take enough photos of our food art. There are so many missed opportunities and grape season is almost over!

Food art: reindeer made with grape stems

We’ve made dinosaurs, dogs and other animals with grape stems but unfortunately I don’t have any photos of them. I do have a picture of a giraffe though. It was quite a challenge to find a grape stem that would stand up long enough for me to snap a photo without my four-year old trying to knock it over.

Food art: giraffe made with grape stems

Panda Express seems to be a place where creativity can spur at any moment. When my eldest was five years old, he created this palm tree with celery and a piece of chicken.

Food art: palm tree made with celery and chicken

And sometimes you don’t have too do much but pay attention to what’s right in front of your face. I’ve shown you this photo before but for those of you who missed it the first time, I’ve worth its weight in gold. Some people see the face of Jesus on toast. We see pigs! Courtesy of Panda Express, I present you the orange chicken pig, who just appeared on my son’s plate one day. The slogan was right: “Pork, it’s the other white meat!”

Pig made with orange chicken at Panda Express

Did you play with your food when you were a kid? Do you do it as a grown-up, alone or with your kids?