How NOT to Make a Turkey-Shaped Fruit Salad

Recently, my daughter’s school was having a pot luck feast to celebrate Thanksgiving.  I wanted to bring something healthy, yet fun.  I had been eyeing those beautiful Turkey-shaped fruit salad platters on Pinterest.  I’m sure you’ve seen them…turkey fruit platters made with a pear for the body, raisin eyes, and a rainbow of colorful fruit for the  feathers. “Perfect!” I thought.  “Simple and healthy. I’ll make that.”

What could go wrong?

 

Now fair readers, there were quite a few things that I did not take into consideration when I thought “oooh fruit salad–eezy peezy” and I thought I’d just share them with you so if you decide to make a wondrous Pinterest-inspired turkey-shaped fruit salad, you will not succumb to the same pitfalls that plagued me.

5 Tips to Make a Turkey Shaped Fruit Salad

TIP #1:  Don’t try and use berries. Use seasonal fruit instead

Thanksgiving falls at the end of November at a time when golden harvest vegetables are at their peak–NOT berries bursting with fruity rainbow goodness. I’m not sure where these fellow Pinterest Pinners are getting their beautiful bounty of berries but when I went to the store, the few I found were covered with bruises and not appetizing at all.

ALTERNATIVE:  Go for yummy apples in a variety of colors, bananas, and easy to peel mini oranges like Halo’s or Cuties. The mini oranges are great because they’re seedless and super easy to peel (for mom’s in a hurry! or for kids that are a helping).

Tip #2:  Use an apple cutter to cut the apple pieces quickly.

I cut them in half again to make them easier to eat for the small children.

Mornings at our house are crazy!  Between getting myself ready for work and my two toddlers dressed, teeth brushed, hair done, and fed–woooh, there’s no time for anything else.  So I like to get bags packed the night before. And this is where Tip #3 comes in….

Tip #3:  Fruit salad needs to be served fresh, so allow EXTRA TIME in the morning!

As we all know, when left out it oxidizes and turns brown (unless of course you use lemon juice but I was afraid of finicky nursery schoolers not being down for that tangy taste).  Sadly, this food choice was NOT a “prepare ahead of time” dish.

So what’s a mom to do?

Get up extra early day of and prepare said Turkey-Shaped Fruit Salad.  

{Sidebar:  Ya know, nursery and/or all schools should come with a drive through Starbucks.  Drop your kid off, pick up your latte and you’re on your way! BRILLIANT!}

Tip #4:  Have a Proper Sized Container Ready.

Be sure to think about how you will be serving or more importantly transporting the Turkey-Shaped Fruit Salad.  I, fair readers, did not. Yikes!  And was faced morning of, running around my kitchen, trying to find a portable round serving container in which to transport my work of art safely.

All I could find was a rectangular container.  It worked pretty well as I was able to stuff in all the fruit pieces so they wouldn’t move and lose their shape, however….

…my fruit salad ended up looking more like an OCTOPUS than a TURKEY!

Tip #5:  Consider putting the fruit on skewers to hold the shape.

I opted not to use skewers because I wanted the teacher to be able to just scoop out the pieces.

(Ok actually, I forgot skewers-but I also didn’t think our nursery school teacher would really appreciate me sending sticks to a pirate-sword-fight-loving class anyway).  And one advantage to not using skewers is you have more flexibility in creating the feather shapes.  I was able to use the smaller fruit pieces to fill in gaps.

So that, my friends, is the story of how NOT to make a turkey-shaped fruit salad or how to make a cool, portable Octopus-shaped fruit salad.

Have you ever had a recipe turn out not quite as you expected? I’d love to hear your stories.  Leave me a comment below.

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HI! I’m a Shana, self-proclaimed Media Mixologist, wife, and mom to two little girls. I love to mix up cocktails of crafts, recipes, wellness, family and business with just the right amount of sparkle to help you shine everyday. So, grab a glass, and let’s celebrate the cocktail of life!